jack-o-lanterns
APM
Joy’s ready for some Halloweeny fun, but her jack-o’-lantern pal Lionel wants to skip the whole thing. He doesn’t understand why carving pumpkins is such an important Halloween tradition! Why don’t we just paint faces on bananas and call it a day?Lucky for Lionel, Joy and co-host Baron are ready to explain the twisty history of jack-o’-lanterns! First, they’ll wade into the history of ignus fatuus, a mysterious blue light seen in bogs at night and the creepy myth it inspired! Then they’ll explore pumpkin pranks in early America and learn how carving pumpkins came to be associated with Halloween. All that, plus a sweet new First Things First featuring Halloween candy!
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JOY: Hey, parents, just a heads up before we get started. This episode covers the history of jack-o'-lanterns. We talk about some myths and Halloweeny stuff so feel free to skip if you're not into that kind of thing. On with the show.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
O jack-o'-lantern! Where are you, pumpkin?
JACK-O'-LANTERN: I'm busy.
BARON: Joy, I think he's in your closet.
JOY: I've been looking everywhere for you, pumpkin pal. It's almost time for the Halloween party.
JACK-O'-LANTERN: Sorry, can't come. I'm booking myself a trip to Hawaii.
BARON: But we need you. You're a jack-o'-lantern. You are the spirit of Halloween.
JOY: Yeah, and tonight's the big night. It's Halloween, Jack.
JACK-O'-LANTERN: Did you just call me, Jack?
JOY: Yes.
JACK-O'-LANTERN: Joy, just because I'm a jack-o'-lantern doesn't mean my name is Jack. It's actually Lionel.
JOY: OK.
BARON: Lionel-o'-lantern?
JOY: Not the same ring to it, but still cool.
LIONEL: Thank you.
[PHONE RINGS]
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to take this call from my travel agent. Hello, Bob? The Pumpkin Spice Hotel suite is a yes.
JOY: But Lionel, you were made for Halloween. You can't skip out now.
LIONEL: Why do you need me? Paint a face on a banana or put some googly eyes on an eggplant.
BARON: No, it has to be a pumpkin with a cute and crooked smile and a little light inside.
LIONEL: That's my problem. It's so random. Why a pumpkin? Why the carved face? It makes no sense.
I can't play the part of a Halloween mascot if I don't understand my motivation. But I can get into a pumpkin-sized Speedo and hit the beach. So if you'll excuse me.
JOY: That's it! You just need to know where you come from. And boy, woo-wee, let me tell you, Jack-- or Lionel, it is some fascinating stuff. Grade A pure head scratching history. But if the beach is more interesting.
LIONEL: Wait, you mean all my randomness has a reason? I want to hear it.
JOY: Great. Then come with me. You're going to hear a history to be proud of, pumpkin.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
You're listening to "Forever Ago" from APM Studios. I'm your host, Joy Dolo, and I'm here today with Baron from Eagan, Minnesota. And Lionel the jack-o'-lantern from my closet. Hi, guys.
BARON: Hey, Joy.
LIONEL: Hello. Ready to get this episode "startled?"
[CHUCKLES]
But seriously, my flight for Hawaii leaves in five hours.
JOY: We got you, Lionel. Stay with us. You're in for a treat. So, Baron, what do you love most about Halloween?
BARON: I love how spooky and creepy the season is.
JOY: Yeah, you don't get scared at all?
BARON: No, I actually love scary things. I've loved them since I was a little kid.
JOY: Do you have any unique Halloween traditions that you like to do?
BARON: Me and my dad set up a haunted trail every year, and we throw a really big Halloween party where we invite all of our friends.
JOY: Whoa! So tell me more about this haunted trail.
BARON: So we usually get a couple animatronics to get. And some people will help out to jump out and stuff. And usually, I'll be the tour guide so I'll lead them through it all.
JOY: Oh, my gosh, that sounds terrifying.
[LAUGHS]
No offense. I would never go. I'm so scared of everything.
[LAUGHS]
So you have friends and family that will hide out? Is it like in a corn maze? Is it like--
BARON: No, we have a little of forest in our backyard. So we'll just cut out a trail for people to go through.
JOY: Have you ever been one of the people that hides out and jumps out at people, or are you always the tour guide?
BARON: I've done it a couple of times.
[GIGGLES]
JOY: Do people scream really loud?
BARON: Yeah.
[LAUGHS]
JOY: That's great. I want to go. Have you ever carved a pumpkin before?
BARON: I have.
JOY: Did you do the traditional, if you think of a pumpkin, the traditional smile with the triangle eyes or did you do something spectacular?
BARON: I did, Jack the Skellington from "Nightmare Before Christmas."
JOY: Whoa!
BARON: Yeah.
JOY: How did you do that?
BARON: I just got the picture. And then you just trace it and then cut it out really. Yeah.
JOY: Oh, man, that's so sweet. You have the best Halloween. I don't think I've ever done anything that cool before.
[LAUGHS]
Do you ever go to pumpkin patches?
BARON: Yes. They're actually probably my favorite part. I feel like it feels really good once you find the right pumpkin. You're like, oh, this is going to be so good.
JOY: Yeah.
BARON: It's kind of like a treasure hunt trying to find the right one.
JOY: Yeah. So what are the list of top three things that you need for the perfect pumpkin?
BARON: I think it needs to be nice and round. And you need to check the whole thing to make sure there's not weird spots on it or stuff like that.
JOY: Right. Yeah.
BARON: And then you want it to be pretty big too, but you don't want it to be so humongous that you can't carry it or anything.
JOY: Smart. Smart. All right. Well, now I have some things to think about when I go to the pumpkin patch this year. I never really did pumpkin carving or anything like that. I think I did it once where we scooped out some seeds and we roasted the pumpkin seeds. But I've never actually sat and drawn on a pumpkin face and done it.
Even though I never carved pumpkins, I've always admired them. Jack-o'-lanterns are iconic. See, Jack, you're a big part of Halloween festivities and fun.
LIONEL: It's Lionel, Joy. Get with the program.
JOY: Oh, my "ghoul-ness," of course.
LIONEL: But really, what's up with all this Jack stuff? I mean, where does the name jack-o'-lantern come from?
JOY: Oh, I'll tell you. The origin of the jack-o'-lantern is actually pieced together from several different stories. The light, the carved faces, the pumpkins, they all started with their own history. And all of it came together to make you.
BARON: Yeah, you're like a soup with ingredients from different times and places.
LIONEL: OK, I'm listening.
JOY: Let's start with your little glowing light. That goes back to real mysterious lights often seen in swamps or marshes. Imagine this. You're walking home through a marshy field. As the sun disappears and darkness settles around you, you shiver.
There's a chill in the air. It's fall when, according to many ancient traditions, spirits walk the Earth. You're squelching along when suddenly you see something up ahead, a faint, glowing blue light.
BARON: Is it a lantern, a small fire, a ghost?
JOY: No, it's ignis fatuus.
LIONEL: What is "ignas" "fatuwas?"
JOY: It's a mysterious blue light seen in swamps at night.
BARON: We're not sure what causes it, but scientists believe it might be caused by gas coming from the ground.
JOY: Swamps are full of wet, decaying grass, trees, and leaves. And as these things break down, they release gas. We think the gas might light up or ignite out of nowhere, and that could make little bursts of glowing light.
BARON: Whatever causes it, this blue light has been seen in swamps around the world for centuries.
JOY: And people have come up with lots of stories to explain it over the years. Some thought the lights were ghosts with lanterns. Others thought they were magic flames made by fairies.
BARON: And people came up with names for it like will-o'-the-wisp and--
JOY: jack-o'-lantern!
LIONEL: So I'm named after a mysterious light seen in swamps at night. Makes sense. My mom always told me I was the light of the party. But why did they call those lights jack-o'-lantern anyway?
BARON: Well, a lot of people thought the lights looked like someone wandering around with a lantern at night.
JOY: And back in the day, in England and Scotland, night watchmen or security guards who worked at night were called Jack of the lantern because Jack was the name people used to refer to men they didn't know and because these night watchmen were usually carrying a lantern.
BARON: So you are named after a mysterious light that looked like a guy with the lantern, jack-o'-lantern.
LIONEL: Kablooey! Mind blown! Though I think Lionel-o'-lantern would have been a more charming name for a night watchman, don't you?
JOY: I like the double L, but that's just one part of your history. Are you ready for another piece of the puzzle?
LIONEL: You better "boo-lieve" it.
[LAUGHS]
BARON: This next one is a myth people started telling about the man behind the jack-o'-lantern light.
JOY: It was the 1600s, back when ladies wore ruffly petticoats under their dresses, people galloped across the countryside on horseback, and everything was lit by candlelight. And around this time, some people started telling a myth to explain ignis fatuus.
LIONEL: The star of this myth was a man who outsmarted the devil.
JOY: He went by many names. But in the most famous version of the story from Ireland, he usually went by Stingy Jack.
STINGY JACK: That's my name.
JOY: Now, this Jack character was famous for being mischievous and selfish. He didn't like to share. And he managed to trick the devil not once, not twice, but three whole times.
STINGY JACK: [LAUGHS]
Take that you fiery old fop.
BARON: The myth goes, when Jack finally died and trudged up to heaven, he was turned away for being a trickster. So he trekked down to the underworld.
JOY: But when he arrived, the devil thought, oh, brother, not this guy again. And he yanked the gates shut and hurled a lump of hot coal after him.
STINGY JACK: Yipes!
BARON: But plot twist, that glowing piece of coal ended up being pretty useful.
STINGY JACK: Actually, handy to have a light. Thanks, devil.
JOY: So Jack got to work. He hollowed out a turnip, which is a root vegetable that looks like what would happen if a beet and a potato had a baby. Then he picked up the lump of coal.
STINGY JACK: Hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot!
BARON: Put it inside the hollowed out turnip. And voila, he had a handy-dandy lantern.
STINGY JACK: Ta-da!
JOY: And as the old myth goes, to this day, Jack still wanders the Earth, carrying the glowing coal in his turnip lantern.
LIONEL: "Fangs" for the fun story, but why did Jack use a turnip for a lantern and not a pumpkin?
JOY: Back then in Ireland, people often hollowed out root vegetables like turnips and beets and used them as lanterns.
BARON: They didn't really grow pumpkins in Ireland, but turnips were pretty easy to get.
JOY: And sometimes people carved scary faces into their turnip lanterns, too.
BARON: Yeah, some Irish turnip lanterns had super creepy faces.
LIONEL: Creepier than me?
JOY: No one is creepier than you, Lionel.
LIONEL: Wow! Thanks, Joy. Maybe I should just embrace it. My name is fascinating. I'm named after spooky light and a guy who tricked the devil?
BARON: See, we told you.
LIONEL: Hawaii is seeming less appealing by the minute, but you still haven't answered a crucial question. How did carved pumpkins like me become a thing? Why aren't turnips the go-to mascot for Halloween?
JOY: "Orange" you excited to find out?
LIONEL: I am.
JOY: Great! We'll have to hop over to America in the 1800s to tell that part of the story. But first, let's play--
CROWD: First Things First!
JOY: This is the game where we take three things from history and try to put them in order of which came first, second, and most recent in time. In honor of Halloween and all the candy will be eating, today's three things are Snickers, Twizzlers, and candy corn. Baron, which do you think came first, which came second, and which came most recently in history?
BARON: I think candy corn came first because that seems older and it's been around for a while. And then I think Twizzlers are more like artificial and stuff, but they've also been around for a while. So that seems like it's older but not as old as the candy corn. And I feel like Snickers are a modern thing.
JOY: Yeah, Snickers came out like a couple of weeks ago.
[LAUGHS]
I'm just kidding. But of the recent times. Do you like any of these candies?
BARON: I like Snickers a lot.
JOY: Yeah. Is there something about the gooeyness, or the nuts, or the weird nougat-y thing?
[GIGGLES]
BARON: Yeah, just like-- I don't know. It tastes so good.
JOY: Yeah. I'm a huge Twizzlers fan. I literally have half a bag of it in my car right now. So first up, we have candy corn. And then next is Twizzlers. And most recent in history, we have Snickers. Yeah?
BARON: Yep.
JOY: You ready to lock that in?
BARON: Let's lock in.
JOY: Let's lock it in. We'll hear are the answers at the end of the episode right after the credits.
BARON: So stick around.
[STEADY DRUMMING]
JOY: Hey, "Forever Ago," friends. We love hearing from our listeners. We want to know, what topic would you like to explore on the show? Is there an invention or time period you'd like to learn more about? Baron, what's something from history you're curious about?
BARON: If all of the dinosaurs were wiped out by the meteor, then how are birds related to them?
[GASP]
JOY: That is a great question. How are they related? Oh, this might be a whole episode. Listeners, if you have a great question like that or anything about history, record yourself asking your question and send it to us at foreverago.org/contact.
And while you're there, you can send us fan art, like maybe a picture of me and Hermie the elephant having a tea party.
BARON: And keep listening.
CREW 1: Brains On universe is a family of podcasts for kids and their adults. Since you're a fan of "Forever Ago," we know you'll love the other shows in our universe. Come on, let's explore.
CREW 2: Here we are in Brains On universe, home to my favorite podcasts, "Brains On," "Smash Boom Best," "Forever ago."
[GASP]
I found one. "Smash Boom Best," the smart, funny debate show.
INTERVIEWER: Please give us the skinny on why seashells are superior.
SUBJECT: Ultimately, seashells are great because beach.
[LAUGHS]
CREW 2: What a great show. Need more "Smash Boom Best" now.
CREW 1: Listen to "Smash Boom Best" wherever you get your podcasts.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
JOY: You're listening to "Forever Ago." I'm Joy.
BARON: And I'm Baron.
LIONEL: And I'm Lionel the jack-o'-lantern.
JOY: We just heard about a mysterious light seen in swamps at night. Some people called it jack-o'-lantern.
BARON: And we heard the myth of Jack.
JOY: And how according to legend, he walks the Earth carrying a hollowed out turnip lantern lit with a lump of coal from the devil.
LIONEL: But what I want to know is why Jack didn't use a pumpkin lantern in that old myth?
JOY: A "gourd-eous" question, Lionel, which brings us to tale number three. Cue the music.
BARON: Welcome to America In the early 1800s.
JOY: Back then, people didn't have toilets, or running water, or Snickers, or Skittles, or Tootsie Rolls.
LIONEL: Tootsie rolls are the worst Halloween candy anyway.
JOY: What? OK, agree to disagree. Anyway, Americans mostly lived in the countryside back then.
BARON: And to entertain themselves, kids pulled pranks.
JOY: And one of the best pranks of all involved carving a face into a pumpkin.
BARON: Back then, pumpkins were everywhere.
LIONEL: Sounds like my kind of place.
JOY: Pumpkins were delicious, nutritious, and pretty easy to grow. So Americans grew a lot of them to feed themselves and their animals.
BARON: And there were more pumpkins than anyone knew what to do with.
JOY: Except kids. Kids put those pumpkins to work. Imagine this. It's fall on your farm.
You've been working and playing outside all day, and it's time to go in for supper. As you run up the road, darkness sinks around you. And something catches your eye, a glowing, terrifying face peeking out from behind a tree!
[SCREAMS]
Wait a second. That's not a person. It's just a pumpkin with a carved face and a candle inside. You can hear the kids who made it giggling behind the wall.
[GIGGLES]
You've been punked.
BARON: Kids in the early 1800s pulled this kind of pumpkin prank all the time.
JOY: They'd cut the top off of a pumpkin, hollow it out, carve a face into it, and put a candle inside. Then they'd scare their neighbors with it.
BARON: Kids would hide along the road and jump out when their friends walked by.
JOY: Or they'd put the pumpkin on a stick, cover themselves with a sheet, and walk around the neighborhood pretending to have a pumpkin head. This prank was popularized by the "Legend of Sleepy Hollow," starring the headless horseman, a ghostly horseman with a pumpkin for a head.
[HORSE WHINNY]
BARON: And by the middle of the 1800s, these hollowed out pumpkins with faces started being called--
BOTH: Jack-o'-lanterns!
LIONEL: Wow! So why were American pumpkin heads called jack-o'-lantern too?
JOY: We're not 100% sure. But when Irish and Scottish people came to the US, they brought the tradition of carving turnips with them.
BARON: And there were a lot of pumpkins in America. So historians think Irish and Scottish immigrants started carving scary faces in pumpkins too.
JOY: And all these threads came together to make one unique thing, a carved pumpkin with a glowing face called a jack-o'-lantern.
LIONEL: "Fab-boo-lous!" I love it.
BARON: And as Halloween became more popular, jack-o'-lanterns did too. And after all, we celebrate Halloween in the fall, the same time pumpkins are ready for harvest.
JOY: By the early 1900s, jack-o'-lantern were a symbol of Halloween.
BARON: And carving pumpkins was a widespread Halloween tradition, and it stuck around ever since.
LIONEL: Now I can see why drawing a face on a banana wouldn't cut it.
JOY: Right? You're a unique blend of history, happenstance, myth, and pranks. True legend status. No one could replace something that special. Plus, carving jack-o'-lantern is creative and fun. And they're beautiful and kind of creepy.
LIONEL: Historic and unique. Artistic and entertaining. Stunning and a little scary. That is me.
Hey, Joy, you still having that Halloween party? I think my Hawaii vacation can wait.
JOY: Woo hoo!
BARON: Yeehaw!
JOY: Let's party!
LIONEL: One second, though. I got a call my travel agent.
[DIAL BEEPS]
Hello, Bob? Cancel my Pumpkin Spice Hotel Suite. I have a party to get to.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
BARON: Hey, Joy. This party is great. And I love your costume. You're a hot dog?
JOY: No, I'm a "halloweenie."
[SNORTS]
And let me guess. You have a turnip lantern. Are you Stingy Jack from the myth?
BARON: Yep.
[GASP]
Very on topic. Nice.
LIONEL: And then I said to him. Just "creeping" it real, pal.
[LAUGHING]
JOY: Whoa, Lionel, making the rounds.
BARON: Everyone thinks he's so funny.
LIONEL: Come on, let's get this party started. This Lionel lantern wants to dance.
[CHEERING]
JOY: Yeah, he's really come out of his shell or rind. Turns out he's much happier repping Halloween now that he knows his story.
BARON: It is kind of wild how the jack-o'-lantern is a mix of so many things. First, you had those mysterious swamp lights.
JOY: Some people thought they looked like night watchmen with glowing lanterns, also called a jack-o'-lantern.
BARON: And there was the story of that tricky guy, Stingy Jack.
JOY: Who wandered the Earth as a ghost with a glowing turnip lantern.
BARON: And eventually, carving pumpkins and putting lights in them became a hot prank in 1800s America.
JOY: Today's jack-o'-lantern are a blend of all these stories and also totally their own thing. So cool.
BARON: Yeah. Oh, hey, look. Lionel is starting a conga line. Let's go join.
JOY: Yes and yes. Boy, that pumpkin knows how to party.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
That's it for this episode of "Forever Ago." It was written by--
ROSIE: Rosie DuPont.
JOY: And produced by--
NICO: Nico Gonzalez Whistler.
JOY: --and--
RUBY: Ruby Guthrie.
JOY: Our editors are Sanden Totten and--
SHAHLA: Shahla Farzan.
JOY: Fact checking by--
JESS: Jess Miller.
JOY: Engineering help from Derek Ramirez with sound design by--
RACHEL: Rachel Briese.
JOY: Original theme music by--
MARC: Marc Sanchez.
JOY: We had additional production help from the rest of the Brains On universe team.
ANNA: Anna Goldfield.
LAUREN: Lauren Humbert.
JOSHUA: Joshua Ray.
MARC: Marc Sanchez.
CHARLOTTE: Charlotte Traver.
ANNA: Anna Weggel.
JOY: --and--
ARON: Aron Woldeslassie.
JOY: Beth Perlman is our executive producer. And the executives in charge of APM Studios are Chandra Kavati and Joanne Griffith. Special thanks to Lesley Bannatyne, Brant Miller, Ewan Kerr and Jillian Peterson.
BARON: And if you want access to ad-free episodes and special bonus content, subscribe to our Smarty Pass.
JOY: OK, Baron. Ready to hear the answers for First Things First.
BARON: You bet I am.
JOY: Oh, yeah, you are. As a reminder, we're putting these three Halloween candies in order of when they were invented. So you said first was candy corn, second was Twizzlers, and third was Snickers.
BARON: Yes.
JOY: Are you ready?
BARON: I am.
JOY: Oh, man, I am so ready for this. You don't even know. I candy believe it. That was a terrible pun. You were right.
[GASP]
BARON: Really?
JOY: Completely right.
BARON: Actually?
JOY: Yeah.
BARON: Yeah!
JOY: All three. Yeah. You got it.
BARON: Wow!
JOY: Give me a high five.
BARON: High five.
JOY: High five.
[LAUGHS]
So candy corn, which you thought was older, was the oldest one. And that was from the 1890s.
BARON: Whoa!
JOY: So candy corn was invented in the 1890s and was originally called chicken feed because it looked like little kernels of corn. It had a rooster on the package and its slogan was, something worth crowing for. I have to disagree because I think candy corn is the worst candy. I would not crow for it.
[LAUGHS]
It has a soft, melts in your mouth texture and mellow sweet, creamy flavor. Like the jack-o'-lantern, candy corn is an iconic symbol of Halloween. October 30 was dubbed National Candy Corn Day in its honor.
And so next up, we have Twizzlers. Twizzlers were invented back in 1929 by a company called Young and Smylie. The original Twizzlers were licorice flavored.
Licorice flavor comes from the licorice plant and can be described as earthy and salty. By the 1970s, new flavors like strawberry, mint, and chocolate were introduced. Do you like the flavor of licorice?
BARON: No, not really. I don't really like licorice.
JOY: That's OK. That's all right. Not even the flavored ones like cherry or--
BARON: No, I don't know. I just never really got them.
JOY: That's OK. It's not for everybody. A lot of people don't like black licorice. And a lot of people don't like candy corn either. So I get you.
BARON: I like candy corn. It's not terrible, but--
JOY: We can still be friends.
BARON: I've got other stuff.
JOY: We're still cool, Baron.
[LAUGHS]
And last but certainly not least is Snickers. And that was from 1930s, the most recent in history. So Snickers bars were invented in 1930s by the Mars family in Chicago. They named the candy bar after their horse, Snickers.
[LAUGHS]
Snickers the horse. It's made of nougat, peanuts, caramel, and milk chocolate. Snickers bars are the best-selling candy bars in the United States and in the world.
BARON: Wow!
JOY: Wow. And you like snickers?
BARON: I love them.
JOY: I like Snickers, too. So we have that we agree on. That's great. That's good. Were you surprised by any of these answers?
BARON: I thought that Snickers were more recent in time. And I didn't think candy corn would be like-- I thought candy corn was maybe like 1930 or something, but it was 1,800.
JOY: Yeah, 1890s, way before that. So Snickers are almost 100 years old.
[LAUGHS]
JOY: That's nuts. That's almost as old as I am.
BARON: Wait. I didn't realize it.
[LAUGHS]
JOY: I'm not that old, Baron, I swear. Join us next week for a new episode. All about the first Black woman to run for president.
BARON: Thanks for listening.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
[MUSIC PLAYING]
O jack-o'-lantern! Where are you, pumpkin?
JACK-O'-LANTERN: I'm busy.
BARON: Joy, I think he's in your closet.
JOY: I've been looking everywhere for you, pumpkin pal. It's almost time for the Halloween party.
JACK-O'-LANTERN: Sorry, can't come. I'm booking myself a trip to Hawaii.
BARON: But we need you. You're a jack-o'-lantern. You are the spirit of Halloween.
JOY: Yeah, and tonight's the big night. It's Halloween, Jack.
JACK-O'-LANTERN: Did you just call me, Jack?
JOY: Yes.
JACK-O'-LANTERN: Joy, just because I'm a jack-o'-lantern doesn't mean my name is Jack. It's actually Lionel.
JOY: OK.
BARON: Lionel-o'-lantern?
JOY: Not the same ring to it, but still cool.
LIONEL: Thank you.
[PHONE RINGS]
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to take this call from my travel agent. Hello, Bob? The Pumpkin Spice Hotel suite is a yes.
JOY: But Lionel, you were made for Halloween. You can't skip out now.
LIONEL: Why do you need me? Paint a face on a banana or put some googly eyes on an eggplant.
BARON: No, it has to be a pumpkin with a cute and crooked smile and a little light inside.
LIONEL: That's my problem. It's so random. Why a pumpkin? Why the carved face? It makes no sense.
I can't play the part of a Halloween mascot if I don't understand my motivation. But I can get into a pumpkin-sized Speedo and hit the beach. So if you'll excuse me.
JOY: That's it! You just need to know where you come from. And boy, woo-wee, let me tell you, Jack-- or Lionel, it is some fascinating stuff. Grade A pure head scratching history. But if the beach is more interesting.
LIONEL: Wait, you mean all my randomness has a reason? I want to hear it.
JOY: Great. Then come with me. You're going to hear a history to be proud of, pumpkin.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
You're listening to "Forever Ago" from APM Studios. I'm your host, Joy Dolo, and I'm here today with Baron from Eagan, Minnesota. And Lionel the jack-o'-lantern from my closet. Hi, guys.
BARON: Hey, Joy.
LIONEL: Hello. Ready to get this episode "startled?"
[CHUCKLES]
But seriously, my flight for Hawaii leaves in five hours.
JOY: We got you, Lionel. Stay with us. You're in for a treat. So, Baron, what do you love most about Halloween?
BARON: I love how spooky and creepy the season is.
JOY: Yeah, you don't get scared at all?
BARON: No, I actually love scary things. I've loved them since I was a little kid.
JOY: Do you have any unique Halloween traditions that you like to do?
BARON: Me and my dad set up a haunted trail every year, and we throw a really big Halloween party where we invite all of our friends.
JOY: Whoa! So tell me more about this haunted trail.
BARON: So we usually get a couple animatronics to get. And some people will help out to jump out and stuff. And usually, I'll be the tour guide so I'll lead them through it all.
JOY: Oh, my gosh, that sounds terrifying.
[LAUGHS]
No offense. I would never go. I'm so scared of everything.
[LAUGHS]
So you have friends and family that will hide out? Is it like in a corn maze? Is it like--
BARON: No, we have a little of forest in our backyard. So we'll just cut out a trail for people to go through.
JOY: Have you ever been one of the people that hides out and jumps out at people, or are you always the tour guide?
BARON: I've done it a couple of times.
[GIGGLES]
JOY: Do people scream really loud?
BARON: Yeah.
[LAUGHS]
JOY: That's great. I want to go. Have you ever carved a pumpkin before?
BARON: I have.
JOY: Did you do the traditional, if you think of a pumpkin, the traditional smile with the triangle eyes or did you do something spectacular?
BARON: I did, Jack the Skellington from "Nightmare Before Christmas."
JOY: Whoa!
BARON: Yeah.
JOY: How did you do that?
BARON: I just got the picture. And then you just trace it and then cut it out really. Yeah.
JOY: Oh, man, that's so sweet. You have the best Halloween. I don't think I've ever done anything that cool before.
[LAUGHS]
Do you ever go to pumpkin patches?
BARON: Yes. They're actually probably my favorite part. I feel like it feels really good once you find the right pumpkin. You're like, oh, this is going to be so good.
JOY: Yeah.
BARON: It's kind of like a treasure hunt trying to find the right one.
JOY: Yeah. So what are the list of top three things that you need for the perfect pumpkin?
BARON: I think it needs to be nice and round. And you need to check the whole thing to make sure there's not weird spots on it or stuff like that.
JOY: Right. Yeah.
BARON: And then you want it to be pretty big too, but you don't want it to be so humongous that you can't carry it or anything.
JOY: Smart. Smart. All right. Well, now I have some things to think about when I go to the pumpkin patch this year. I never really did pumpkin carving or anything like that. I think I did it once where we scooped out some seeds and we roasted the pumpkin seeds. But I've never actually sat and drawn on a pumpkin face and done it.
Even though I never carved pumpkins, I've always admired them. Jack-o'-lanterns are iconic. See, Jack, you're a big part of Halloween festivities and fun.
LIONEL: It's Lionel, Joy. Get with the program.
JOY: Oh, my "ghoul-ness," of course.
LIONEL: But really, what's up with all this Jack stuff? I mean, where does the name jack-o'-lantern come from?
JOY: Oh, I'll tell you. The origin of the jack-o'-lantern is actually pieced together from several different stories. The light, the carved faces, the pumpkins, they all started with their own history. And all of it came together to make you.
BARON: Yeah, you're like a soup with ingredients from different times and places.
LIONEL: OK, I'm listening.
JOY: Let's start with your little glowing light. That goes back to real mysterious lights often seen in swamps or marshes. Imagine this. You're walking home through a marshy field. As the sun disappears and darkness settles around you, you shiver.
There's a chill in the air. It's fall when, according to many ancient traditions, spirits walk the Earth. You're squelching along when suddenly you see something up ahead, a faint, glowing blue light.
BARON: Is it a lantern, a small fire, a ghost?
JOY: No, it's ignis fatuus.
LIONEL: What is "ignas" "fatuwas?"
JOY: It's a mysterious blue light seen in swamps at night.
BARON: We're not sure what causes it, but scientists believe it might be caused by gas coming from the ground.
JOY: Swamps are full of wet, decaying grass, trees, and leaves. And as these things break down, they release gas. We think the gas might light up or ignite out of nowhere, and that could make little bursts of glowing light.
BARON: Whatever causes it, this blue light has been seen in swamps around the world for centuries.
JOY: And people have come up with lots of stories to explain it over the years. Some thought the lights were ghosts with lanterns. Others thought they were magic flames made by fairies.
BARON: And people came up with names for it like will-o'-the-wisp and--
JOY: jack-o'-lantern!
LIONEL: So I'm named after a mysterious light seen in swamps at night. Makes sense. My mom always told me I was the light of the party. But why did they call those lights jack-o'-lantern anyway?
BARON: Well, a lot of people thought the lights looked like someone wandering around with a lantern at night.
JOY: And back in the day, in England and Scotland, night watchmen or security guards who worked at night were called Jack of the lantern because Jack was the name people used to refer to men they didn't know and because these night watchmen were usually carrying a lantern.
BARON: So you are named after a mysterious light that looked like a guy with the lantern, jack-o'-lantern.
LIONEL: Kablooey! Mind blown! Though I think Lionel-o'-lantern would have been a more charming name for a night watchman, don't you?
JOY: I like the double L, but that's just one part of your history. Are you ready for another piece of the puzzle?
LIONEL: You better "boo-lieve" it.
[LAUGHS]
BARON: This next one is a myth people started telling about the man behind the jack-o'-lantern light.
JOY: It was the 1600s, back when ladies wore ruffly petticoats under their dresses, people galloped across the countryside on horseback, and everything was lit by candlelight. And around this time, some people started telling a myth to explain ignis fatuus.
LIONEL: The star of this myth was a man who outsmarted the devil.
JOY: He went by many names. But in the most famous version of the story from Ireland, he usually went by Stingy Jack.
STINGY JACK: That's my name.
JOY: Now, this Jack character was famous for being mischievous and selfish. He didn't like to share. And he managed to trick the devil not once, not twice, but three whole times.
STINGY JACK: [LAUGHS]
Take that you fiery old fop.
BARON: The myth goes, when Jack finally died and trudged up to heaven, he was turned away for being a trickster. So he trekked down to the underworld.
JOY: But when he arrived, the devil thought, oh, brother, not this guy again. And he yanked the gates shut and hurled a lump of hot coal after him.
STINGY JACK: Yipes!
BARON: But plot twist, that glowing piece of coal ended up being pretty useful.
STINGY JACK: Actually, handy to have a light. Thanks, devil.
JOY: So Jack got to work. He hollowed out a turnip, which is a root vegetable that looks like what would happen if a beet and a potato had a baby. Then he picked up the lump of coal.
STINGY JACK: Hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot!
BARON: Put it inside the hollowed out turnip. And voila, he had a handy-dandy lantern.
STINGY JACK: Ta-da!
JOY: And as the old myth goes, to this day, Jack still wanders the Earth, carrying the glowing coal in his turnip lantern.
LIONEL: "Fangs" for the fun story, but why did Jack use a turnip for a lantern and not a pumpkin?
JOY: Back then in Ireland, people often hollowed out root vegetables like turnips and beets and used them as lanterns.
BARON: They didn't really grow pumpkins in Ireland, but turnips were pretty easy to get.
JOY: And sometimes people carved scary faces into their turnip lanterns, too.
BARON: Yeah, some Irish turnip lanterns had super creepy faces.
LIONEL: Creepier than me?
JOY: No one is creepier than you, Lionel.
LIONEL: Wow! Thanks, Joy. Maybe I should just embrace it. My name is fascinating. I'm named after spooky light and a guy who tricked the devil?
BARON: See, we told you.
LIONEL: Hawaii is seeming less appealing by the minute, but you still haven't answered a crucial question. How did carved pumpkins like me become a thing? Why aren't turnips the go-to mascot for Halloween?
JOY: "Orange" you excited to find out?
LIONEL: I am.
JOY: Great! We'll have to hop over to America in the 1800s to tell that part of the story. But first, let's play--
CROWD: First Things First!
JOY: This is the game where we take three things from history and try to put them in order of which came first, second, and most recent in time. In honor of Halloween and all the candy will be eating, today's three things are Snickers, Twizzlers, and candy corn. Baron, which do you think came first, which came second, and which came most recently in history?
BARON: I think candy corn came first because that seems older and it's been around for a while. And then I think Twizzlers are more like artificial and stuff, but they've also been around for a while. So that seems like it's older but not as old as the candy corn. And I feel like Snickers are a modern thing.
JOY: Yeah, Snickers came out like a couple of weeks ago.
[LAUGHS]
I'm just kidding. But of the recent times. Do you like any of these candies?
BARON: I like Snickers a lot.
JOY: Yeah. Is there something about the gooeyness, or the nuts, or the weird nougat-y thing?
[GIGGLES]
BARON: Yeah, just like-- I don't know. It tastes so good.
JOY: Yeah. I'm a huge Twizzlers fan. I literally have half a bag of it in my car right now. So first up, we have candy corn. And then next is Twizzlers. And most recent in history, we have Snickers. Yeah?
BARON: Yep.
JOY: You ready to lock that in?
BARON: Let's lock in.
JOY: Let's lock it in. We'll hear are the answers at the end of the episode right after the credits.
BARON: So stick around.
[STEADY DRUMMING]
JOY: Hey, "Forever Ago," friends. We love hearing from our listeners. We want to know, what topic would you like to explore on the show? Is there an invention or time period you'd like to learn more about? Baron, what's something from history you're curious about?
BARON: If all of the dinosaurs were wiped out by the meteor, then how are birds related to them?
[GASP]
JOY: That is a great question. How are they related? Oh, this might be a whole episode. Listeners, if you have a great question like that or anything about history, record yourself asking your question and send it to us at foreverago.org/contact.
And while you're there, you can send us fan art, like maybe a picture of me and Hermie the elephant having a tea party.
BARON: And keep listening.
CREW 1: Brains On universe is a family of podcasts for kids and their adults. Since you're a fan of "Forever Ago," we know you'll love the other shows in our universe. Come on, let's explore.
CREW 2: Here we are in Brains On universe, home to my favorite podcasts, "Brains On," "Smash Boom Best," "Forever ago."
[GASP]
I found one. "Smash Boom Best," the smart, funny debate show.
INTERVIEWER: Please give us the skinny on why seashells are superior.
SUBJECT: Ultimately, seashells are great because beach.
[LAUGHS]
CREW 2: What a great show. Need more "Smash Boom Best" now.
CREW 1: Listen to "Smash Boom Best" wherever you get your podcasts.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
JOY: You're listening to "Forever Ago." I'm Joy.
BARON: And I'm Baron.
LIONEL: And I'm Lionel the jack-o'-lantern.
JOY: We just heard about a mysterious light seen in swamps at night. Some people called it jack-o'-lantern.
BARON: And we heard the myth of Jack.
JOY: And how according to legend, he walks the Earth carrying a hollowed out turnip lantern lit with a lump of coal from the devil.
LIONEL: But what I want to know is why Jack didn't use a pumpkin lantern in that old myth?
JOY: A "gourd-eous" question, Lionel, which brings us to tale number three. Cue the music.
BARON: Welcome to America In the early 1800s.
JOY: Back then, people didn't have toilets, or running water, or Snickers, or Skittles, or Tootsie Rolls.
LIONEL: Tootsie rolls are the worst Halloween candy anyway.
JOY: What? OK, agree to disagree. Anyway, Americans mostly lived in the countryside back then.
BARON: And to entertain themselves, kids pulled pranks.
JOY: And one of the best pranks of all involved carving a face into a pumpkin.
BARON: Back then, pumpkins were everywhere.
LIONEL: Sounds like my kind of place.
JOY: Pumpkins were delicious, nutritious, and pretty easy to grow. So Americans grew a lot of them to feed themselves and their animals.
BARON: And there were more pumpkins than anyone knew what to do with.
JOY: Except kids. Kids put those pumpkins to work. Imagine this. It's fall on your farm.
You've been working and playing outside all day, and it's time to go in for supper. As you run up the road, darkness sinks around you. And something catches your eye, a glowing, terrifying face peeking out from behind a tree!
[SCREAMS]
Wait a second. That's not a person. It's just a pumpkin with a carved face and a candle inside. You can hear the kids who made it giggling behind the wall.
[GIGGLES]
You've been punked.
BARON: Kids in the early 1800s pulled this kind of pumpkin prank all the time.
JOY: They'd cut the top off of a pumpkin, hollow it out, carve a face into it, and put a candle inside. Then they'd scare their neighbors with it.
BARON: Kids would hide along the road and jump out when their friends walked by.
JOY: Or they'd put the pumpkin on a stick, cover themselves with a sheet, and walk around the neighborhood pretending to have a pumpkin head. This prank was popularized by the "Legend of Sleepy Hollow," starring the headless horseman, a ghostly horseman with a pumpkin for a head.
[HORSE WHINNY]
BARON: And by the middle of the 1800s, these hollowed out pumpkins with faces started being called--
BOTH: Jack-o'-lanterns!
LIONEL: Wow! So why were American pumpkin heads called jack-o'-lantern too?
JOY: We're not 100% sure. But when Irish and Scottish people came to the US, they brought the tradition of carving turnips with them.
BARON: And there were a lot of pumpkins in America. So historians think Irish and Scottish immigrants started carving scary faces in pumpkins too.
JOY: And all these threads came together to make one unique thing, a carved pumpkin with a glowing face called a jack-o'-lantern.
LIONEL: "Fab-boo-lous!" I love it.
BARON: And as Halloween became more popular, jack-o'-lanterns did too. And after all, we celebrate Halloween in the fall, the same time pumpkins are ready for harvest.
JOY: By the early 1900s, jack-o'-lantern were a symbol of Halloween.
BARON: And carving pumpkins was a widespread Halloween tradition, and it stuck around ever since.
LIONEL: Now I can see why drawing a face on a banana wouldn't cut it.
JOY: Right? You're a unique blend of history, happenstance, myth, and pranks. True legend status. No one could replace something that special. Plus, carving jack-o'-lantern is creative and fun. And they're beautiful and kind of creepy.
LIONEL: Historic and unique. Artistic and entertaining. Stunning and a little scary. That is me.
Hey, Joy, you still having that Halloween party? I think my Hawaii vacation can wait.
JOY: Woo hoo!
BARON: Yeehaw!
JOY: Let's party!
LIONEL: One second, though. I got a call my travel agent.
[DIAL BEEPS]
Hello, Bob? Cancel my Pumpkin Spice Hotel Suite. I have a party to get to.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
BARON: Hey, Joy. This party is great. And I love your costume. You're a hot dog?
JOY: No, I'm a "halloweenie."
[SNORTS]
And let me guess. You have a turnip lantern. Are you Stingy Jack from the myth?
BARON: Yep.
[GASP]
Very on topic. Nice.
LIONEL: And then I said to him. Just "creeping" it real, pal.
[LAUGHING]
JOY: Whoa, Lionel, making the rounds.
BARON: Everyone thinks he's so funny.
LIONEL: Come on, let's get this party started. This Lionel lantern wants to dance.
[CHEERING]
JOY: Yeah, he's really come out of his shell or rind. Turns out he's much happier repping Halloween now that he knows his story.
BARON: It is kind of wild how the jack-o'-lantern is a mix of so many things. First, you had those mysterious swamp lights.
JOY: Some people thought they looked like night watchmen with glowing lanterns, also called a jack-o'-lantern.
BARON: And there was the story of that tricky guy, Stingy Jack.
JOY: Who wandered the Earth as a ghost with a glowing turnip lantern.
BARON: And eventually, carving pumpkins and putting lights in them became a hot prank in 1800s America.
JOY: Today's jack-o'-lantern are a blend of all these stories and also totally their own thing. So cool.
BARON: Yeah. Oh, hey, look. Lionel is starting a conga line. Let's go join.
JOY: Yes and yes. Boy, that pumpkin knows how to party.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
That's it for this episode of "Forever Ago." It was written by--
ROSIE: Rosie DuPont.
JOY: And produced by--
NICO: Nico Gonzalez Whistler.
JOY: --and--
RUBY: Ruby Guthrie.
JOY: Our editors are Sanden Totten and--
SHAHLA: Shahla Farzan.
JOY: Fact checking by--
JESS: Jess Miller.
JOY: Engineering help from Derek Ramirez with sound design by--
RACHEL: Rachel Briese.
JOY: Original theme music by--
MARC: Marc Sanchez.
JOY: We had additional production help from the rest of the Brains On universe team.
ANNA: Anna Goldfield.
LAUREN: Lauren Humbert.
JOSHUA: Joshua Ray.
MARC: Marc Sanchez.
CHARLOTTE: Charlotte Traver.
ANNA: Anna Weggel.
JOY: --and--
ARON: Aron Woldeslassie.
JOY: Beth Perlman is our executive producer. And the executives in charge of APM Studios are Chandra Kavati and Joanne Griffith. Special thanks to Lesley Bannatyne, Brant Miller, Ewan Kerr and Jillian Peterson.
BARON: And if you want access to ad-free episodes and special bonus content, subscribe to our Smarty Pass.
JOY: OK, Baron. Ready to hear the answers for First Things First.
BARON: You bet I am.
JOY: Oh, yeah, you are. As a reminder, we're putting these three Halloween candies in order of when they were invented. So you said first was candy corn, second was Twizzlers, and third was Snickers.
BARON: Yes.
JOY: Are you ready?
BARON: I am.
JOY: Oh, man, I am so ready for this. You don't even know. I candy believe it. That was a terrible pun. You were right.
[GASP]
BARON: Really?
JOY: Completely right.
BARON: Actually?
JOY: Yeah.
BARON: Yeah!
JOY: All three. Yeah. You got it.
BARON: Wow!
JOY: Give me a high five.
BARON: High five.
JOY: High five.
[LAUGHS]
So candy corn, which you thought was older, was the oldest one. And that was from the 1890s.
BARON: Whoa!
JOY: So candy corn was invented in the 1890s and was originally called chicken feed because it looked like little kernels of corn. It had a rooster on the package and its slogan was, something worth crowing for. I have to disagree because I think candy corn is the worst candy. I would not crow for it.
[LAUGHS]
It has a soft, melts in your mouth texture and mellow sweet, creamy flavor. Like the jack-o'-lantern, candy corn is an iconic symbol of Halloween. October 30 was dubbed National Candy Corn Day in its honor.
And so next up, we have Twizzlers. Twizzlers were invented back in 1929 by a company called Young and Smylie. The original Twizzlers were licorice flavored.
Licorice flavor comes from the licorice plant and can be described as earthy and salty. By the 1970s, new flavors like strawberry, mint, and chocolate were introduced. Do you like the flavor of licorice?
BARON: No, not really. I don't really like licorice.
JOY: That's OK. That's all right. Not even the flavored ones like cherry or--
BARON: No, I don't know. I just never really got them.
JOY: That's OK. It's not for everybody. A lot of people don't like black licorice. And a lot of people don't like candy corn either. So I get you.
BARON: I like candy corn. It's not terrible, but--
JOY: We can still be friends.
BARON: I've got other stuff.
JOY: We're still cool, Baron.
[LAUGHS]
And last but certainly not least is Snickers. And that was from 1930s, the most recent in history. So Snickers bars were invented in 1930s by the Mars family in Chicago. They named the candy bar after their horse, Snickers.
[LAUGHS]
Snickers the horse. It's made of nougat, peanuts, caramel, and milk chocolate. Snickers bars are the best-selling candy bars in the United States and in the world.
BARON: Wow!
JOY: Wow. And you like snickers?
BARON: I love them.
JOY: I like Snickers, too. So we have that we agree on. That's great. That's good. Were you surprised by any of these answers?
BARON: I thought that Snickers were more recent in time. And I didn't think candy corn would be like-- I thought candy corn was maybe like 1930 or something, but it was 1,800.
JOY: Yeah, 1890s, way before that. So Snickers are almost 100 years old.
[LAUGHS]
JOY: That's nuts. That's almost as old as I am.
BARON: Wait. I didn't realize it.
[LAUGHS]
JOY: I'm not that old, Baron, I swear. Join us next week for a new episode. All about the first Black woman to run for president.
BARON: Thanks for listening.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
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