Prêt à Maudire


All photos: Phyllis Galembo

This buckram mask with straw hair was probably factory made in the 1930s. She is one of several witches pictured in Phyllis Galembo’s Dressed for Thrills: 100 Years of Halloween Costumes and Masquerade (Abrams, 2002). Halloween costumes were largely homemade through the late 1920s, though masks had long been available in stores and catalogs. Not necessarily “from nothing” homemade. Patterns, specially printed fabrics, and detailed instructions in pamphlets and magazines could be pressed into service then as now.

The witch garb below, from the late 1940s or early 1950s, is off the rack, though the mask is still buckram rather than the plastic familiar to baby boomers like myself.




Ah! A clammy K-Mart mask on a chilly Halloween night—rapture!



Galembo has also published a book, Maske, about masquerade traditions in Africa and Haiti.

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