We started it. DHH, 1985, IIRC (must have been, as 1986 I was back in GCS).
The weather was supposed to be cruddier than usual for Halloween, we had custodial/kitchen crew with little kids, and we had a new RC (Kathy, whose last name I do not remember).  RJ (Leonard, the dorm administrator) was reasonably open to trying new things.   My roommate was on Dorm Council, and she came back from a meeting and told the hall (all 9 of us — we were in Lower Squid) “we’re doing Trick or Treating for staff kids.  We need guides and decor and costumes and treats.”  Halloween was in a week. Halls were decorated, people found costumes and bought treats, and on Halloween (which was cold and wet), we ran about 100 kids in groups of 3-4 through the dorm. Two routes, scary and not-so. It was a blast. The parties came along later, when people had more time to plan.

Jenn Ridley ‘86

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I was an RA in DHH in 2003 and 2004 in “The Attic”. Our Safehouse was not as elaborate as some of the ones in Wads, but we always had a blast. The best was the first year where we had the tricker-treaters walk into the bathroom made up like a crime scene with a shower running. The guides walked them through the scene towards the running shower. A resident (Gabe Harris) would pull a string opening the shower. The whole group would look at the open shower (which was empty) and he would jump out behind them. I was in the hall way and could almost time the moment from when he pulled the string to when we would hear screams.

We also had a resident who was an avid rock climber. He (with ample help) converted some of pieces of lofts into a rack that he hung from using his climbing gear. He was smaller than I was, so I lent him some of my clothes which we stuffed to make it look like he was a dummy wearing a mask. As the kids would push past him he would wait to move or attempt to grab them. The most memorable part was when a group of boisterous teenage boys shoved him, exclaiming “It’s just a dummy it’s not even scary”. As the last one was next to him he slid his hand in front of the boy’s face. They all screamed and ran through the end of our hall.

We always had a blast decorating and preparing. I can vividly remember the anticipation and excitement as we would scarf down our dinner and run back up to make the final changes to the hall before the start time of safe house.

Marcus Haney ‘04

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My fondest Halloween memory from Tech was Pumpkin Caroling. We took the Charlie Brown pumpkin carol book that I think Hallmark published in 1972 and went house-to- house caroling because we wouldn’t be on campus for Christmas caroling.  I’m not sure if it was actually an APO activity or just a bunch of my APO brothers and sisters that got together fall of 1972 to do this.

Sandy Shaw