Ghosts, Witches, and Other Halloween Stories

Get into the Halloween spirit with our best stories on the holiday, which include a look into the Salem witch trials and the obsession with Satanism in nineteenth-century France. No tricks, only treats: all stories contain free links to the supporting academic research on JSTOR. Happy Halloween!

Holiday History

Halloween: A Mystic and Eerie Significance

Betsy Golden Kellem October 26, 2022 Despite the prevalence of tricks and spooky spirits in earlier years, the American commercial holiday didn’t develop until the middle of the twentieth century.

How the Great Pumpkin Became Great

Jacqueline Mansky October 21, 2019 The origins of Linus's pumpkin deity, who "rises out of the pumpkin patch and flies through the air and brings toys to all the children in the world."

A Very JSTOR Daily Costume Guide

The Editors October 15, 2021 Get inspired for Halloween with these hand-curated historical images from JSTOR's Open Community Collections!

From Samhain to Halloween

Livia Gershon October 10, 2018 Exploring the Celtic origins of everyone's favorite harvest holiday celebrating thresholds between life and death.

A Roman Feast… of Death!

Amelia Soth October 17, 2019 The banquet hall was painted black from ceiling to floor. By the pale flicker of grave lamps, the invited senators coud make out a row of tombstones.

Trick or Treat Sadists: A Halloween Urban Legend

Erin Blakemore October 30, 2015 Are there a group of trick or treat sadists poisoning the candy they distribute on Halloween?

The Origins of Halloween

Matthew Wills October 31, 2014 Halloween history and ethnography.

Ghosts, Spirits, and Phantasms

How to Summon Spirits

The Editors October 21, 2021The Spiritualist, a newspaper published from 1869-1882, is filled with tales of supernatural phenomena and tips for communicating with the dead.

The Dressy Ghosts of Victorian Literature

Matthew Wills July 30, 2021 Realism was exceptionally well suited (heh) for elaborate descriptions of spectral clothing.

Can You Photograph a Ghost?

The Editors October 25, 2024 William Hope claimed to be able to document the visitations of ghosts. The controversial images he produced add to our understanding of the history of photography.

A Belief in Ghosts: Poetry and the Shared Imagination

Dorothea Lasky October 4, 2016 An essay from poet Dorothea Lasky on poetry, ghosts, and the shared imagination.

Haunted Soldiers in Mesopotamia

Livia Gershon May 20, 2024 In ancient Mesopotamia, many medical disorders were attributed to ghosts, including mental problems faced by men who had spent years at war.

How to Use a Ouija Board

Jonathan Aprea October 24, 2022 Read on, but beware, these tales of spine-tingling ghosts and eerie spirits...

Witches and Their Familiars

Herbs & Verbs: How to Do Witchcraft for Real

Hillary Waterman October 25, 2017 Like for real real.

Nine Black Cat Stickers

The Editors October 27, 2020 They crossed our path and we lived to tell the tale. Check them out in the Street Arts Graphics Collection!

What Caused the Salem Witch Trials?

Vicki Saxon October 27, 2015 Looking into the underlying causes of the Salem Witch Trials in the seventeenth century.

Dial Meow for Murder

Stephanie A. Larson October 26, 2019 Notes on the figure of the feline in horror.

Sex and the Single Witch

Matthew Wills October 23, 2023 On witch-hunting and the pursuit of sexual knowledge in early-modern England.

Is There a Witch Bottle in Your House?

Allison C. Meier May 13, 2019 In the 16th-18th centuries, vessels filled with nails, thorns, hair, and other materials, were used as a form of ritual protection against witches.

Witches’ Marks Protected Spaces from Evil

Allison C. Meier March 8, 2019 Throughout history, people tried to protect spaces from evil with apotropaic marks, ritual concealments, and other charms.

Rachel Carson’s Critics Called Her a Witch

Livia Gershon February 21, 2019 WhenSilent Spring was published, the response was overtly gendered. Rachel Carson's critics depicted her as hysterical, mystical, and witchy.

Vampires

Frankenstein, The Vampyre, and the Spirit of the Humanities

Maria Papadouris October 20, 2026 How one ghost story competition continues to haunt the humanities—just in time for Halloween.

Vampires and Public Health

Ashawnta Jackson September 29, 2022 At the end of the nineteenth century, the people of Rhode Island were drained by a mysterious force that caused them to slowly waste away.

Do Vampires Really Exist?

Matthew Wills October 18, 2021 And how would we know? Let's ask the Enlightenment.

Marxferatu: Teaching Marx with Vampires

Matthew Wills October 30, 2018 For a younger generation trying to understand Marxism, the best way in may be: vampirism.

The Real Vampires of Europe

James MacDonald October 31, 2017 In general, a vampire is a malicious spirit or soul of the deceased who is not confined to the grave. Where did the idea come from?

The Teyollohcuani: Cosmopolitan Vampire Witch

Livia Gershon November 11, 2022 When different cultures meet, their languages, foods, and songs mix and change—and so do their monsters.

Haunted Places and Spaces

Do We Have to Tell Them the House Is Haunted?

Christine Ro October 27, 2018 On the law and mythologies of haunting, from antiquity to today.

How Victorian Mansions Became the Default Haunted House

Erin Blakemore October 16, 2018 Quick: Picture a haunted house. It's probably a Victorian mansion, right? Here's how these structures became signifiers of horror, haunting, and death.

And Other Spooky Things

Birthing the Jersey Devil

Katherine Churchill July 3, 2024 For centuries, a fork-tailed mythical creature that lurks in the pinelands of the Garden State has served as a reminder of the horrors that result when reproductive freedoms are destroyed.

The Very Human Appeal of American Horror Story

Julia Métraux October 3, 2021 The late author Joanna Russ had insights about why horror speaks to ordinary experiences and emotions.

The D-I-Y Origins of Night of the Living Dead

Kristin Hunt November 5, 2020Night of the Living Dead’s production story reads like a means to an end: a rag-tag group of creatives makes a movie on nothing to get noticed.

The Decapitation Experiments of Jean César Legallois

Jess Romeo October 29, 2020 This French scientist conducted a series of gruesome experiments in his quest to discover the true limits of life and death.

The Pious Undead of Medieval Europe

Livia Gershon October 14, 2019 Bishop Thietmar of Merseburg's eight-volume history contained stories of the living dead—and, he believed, proof of the Christian resurrection.

How Scary is Too Scary?

Livia Gershon October 26, 2016 Halloween poses questions for parents, like how scary is too scary for their kids? The answer depends on when we ask the question.

Why We Love to Be Scared

Erin Blakemore September 2, 2016 Nearly 1.5 billion tickets to horror movies were sold in 2015 alone. But why do we love being scared so much?

Satanism and Magic in the Age of the Moulin Rouge

Tara Isabella Burton March 9, 2016 How did some of the most illustrious names of fin de siècle French literature end up in a newspaper battle over witchcraft and evil spirits?

Selling Slashers to Teen Girls

Livia Gershon September 25, 2019 The heroines of 1970s and 80s teen horror movies were traditionally feminine, tough, and sexually confident.

The Horror!

Ellen Walker October 26, 2022 If Dracula represented the collective fears of his day, what do the likes of Slender Man and other internet monsters tell us about the zeitgeist of right now?

The Magic Lantern Shows that Influenced Modern Horror

Allison C. Meier May 12, 2018 Eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century audiences were delighted and horrified by these spectral apparitions conjured in dark rooms.

The Therapeutic Value of Horror Video Games

Farah Mohammed June 15, 2020 In stressful situations, seeking out even more stress can be cathartic.

The Folklorist behind Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

Amy Shearn July 25, 2019 What was that book's deal, anyway?

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