Here's a precursor to The Singing Detective series and film by Dennis Potter.  From Cornell College's 1923 yearbook.

Happy, sad, and expressionless jack-o'-lanterns.  From A Round of Birthdays by Prescott Bailey Bull and illustrated by Eleanor Withey Willard, 1897.

Some hellfire from Duke's 1968 yearbook.  See How to Hoodoo Hack a Yearbook.

The haunted truth of Oct. 31st.  From The Justice newspaper (Brandeis), 1992.

This haunted but not cursed photograph appears in the Western Ontario yearbook of 1961.  See How to Hoodoo Hack a Yearbook.

From Fiskal, 1906.

From Southwestern's 1975 yearbook.

At first glance, we thought he was inventing the Gummy Bear.  (That candy would debut in the ealry 1920s.)  From Baylor's 1916 yearbook.

From Spellbound, 1977.  (Courtesy of Archive.org.)  See this remarkable guide to practial magick you can do with a pencil and paper: The Pencil Witch.

From Rockford's 1975 yearbook.

From Bowman Gray's 1969 yearbook.

Long before Tim Burton combined Christmas and Hallowe'en, Valentine's Day and Hallowe'en merged.  From The Link, 1961.

Here's a precursor to Planet of the Apes, 24 years before the novel was published.  From Der Bärenspiegel, 1939.

"Have an antisocial Halloween."  From B.A.R., 1986.

You'll have already guessed why we posted this photo -- it's because the photographer seems to have placed the classic X-Ray Spex over his lens.

From Charleston Southern's 1968 yearbook.

Non-Europeans will never be able to comprehend Europeans' obsession with sausage.  It is a worldview one must be born into and cannot otherwise acquire or understand even theoretically.  From Der Bärenspiegel, 1925.

Note the ironwork at the bottom of the first photo.  The second shot is framed exactly as we would have done it.  From Wake Forest's 1960 yearbook.

From The Goblin, 1921.

Your ship has come in, if you'd been waiting for Plastic Fantasies.  From Le Charivari, 1887.

"Edward had suffered an incredible accession to his existing personality."  From The Lost Valley and Other Stories by Algernon Blackwood and illustrated by W. Graham Robertson, 1914.

A comfort jack-o'-lantern.  From Lehigh's 1967 yearbook.

Finally, news we can believe in.  "Ghouls and ghosts ready for big night."  From Clarion Call newspaper, 1964.

From Tulane's 1897 yearbook.  The meaning of this particular dice roll is actually explained in Astragalomancy: A Loaded Guide: Intriguing Readings of 21 Discrete Dice Throws.

From UCLA's 1983 yearbook.  See How to Hoodoo Hack a Yearbook.

"Shake 'em up tonight!"  From Duke's 1968 yearbook.

The Midnight Revellers society, from William and Mary's 1901 yearbook.

Memories of college.  From Pembroke's 1974 yearbook.

From "The Strange Case of Steinkelwintz," by Mackinlay Kantor:

***

"There is an odor....But, Max Grame, you can't arrest an odor! I suppose you think that an odor stole my piano?"

Here's a precursor to Morticia Addams' dress.  From Nebelspalter, 1892.

If you've wondered whether a spiral handrail can warp space ...  From Guilford's 1990 yearbook.

Our custom widget that checks for duplicated images suggested this unlikely pairing.  Click each image for its source.

From Clarion Call, 1969.

From the Salem yearbook of 1904.

An illustration by Wellner for Lustige Blätter, 1919.

We always enjoy stumbling upon news of haunted forests suddenly appearing.  We can confirm that haunted forests can, according to our metabolism of time, seem to blink in and out of existence.  From La Vie (Lebanon Valley), 1997.

The saxophone is here called unnatural, abnormal, degenerate, discordant, nervous, and ugly, like America.  From the Muhlenberg Weekly, 1938.

From Central Washington's 1913 yearbook.

"We are made plutocrats of the supernatural. ... Others have money ... or power ... or strength and courage. ... We have gods and ghosts."  —Gene Wolfe, Lake of the Long Sun

The only way to keep a sarcophagus from coveting your beer, in our own experience as plutocrats of the supernatural, is to abstain from beer in the first place.  From Der Bärenspiegel, 1940.

A precursor to R. Crumb, from Lenoir-Rhyne's 1916 yearbook.

An ending is seen in the crystal ball.  From St. Joseph's 1921 yearbook.

News we can believe in.  From City Light newsletter, 1959.  Courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives.

Reblog if you'll be right back.  From West Chester's "Serpentine" yearbook of 1980.

"Whether we believe we can take it with us or not, our worldly possessions hold our energy.  The transfer of energy into inanimate objects may seem strange to some of us, but objects themselves are just energy" (Eleanor Hooks, A Daily Sip of Joy and Peace).  From Catawba's 1987 yearbook.

Reblog if you're an individual winner like this tiny jack-o'-lantern, and if folks had better watch out.  From Memphis State's 1972 yearbook.

"The wizard represented himself as the fountainhead of all knowledge.  He knew the secrets of the past, present, and future."  From Magician's Magic by Paul Curry, 1965.

Note that the 9-letter grid forms a rather difficult Boggle-style game board.  How many words can you find?  Here are some clues:

1. To obtain by deceit (4 letters).

2. An alcohol molecule containing two hydroxyl groups (4 letters).

3. A temporary release (4 letters).

4. Having a strong, disagreeable smell (4 letters).

5. (Archaic) having obeyed; from Arabic, a servant or worshipper (4 letters).

6. Put to death (obsolete form) (4 letters).

7. About 2.2 pounds (4 letters).

8. To open a locked door by sliding a thin piece of plastic between the door edge and frame to force open a spring lock (4 letters).

Answers [highlight to view]: 1. bilk; 2. diol; 3. bail; 4. olid; 5. abid; 6. kild; 7. kilo; 8. loid.  Three-letter words: aid, ail, bad, bid, bio, cid, dab, dib, ilk, jib, jol, kid, lib, lid, oik, oil, old.

Hallowe'en coming earlier every year is nothing new.  Back in 1913, it had already been moved up to Oct. 28.  From Millikin's 1913 yearbook.