Amelia and Hayley Smith, from Nanango, were impressive as a pair of zombie pirates

October 31, 2022

Nanango’s annual celebration of everything that goes bump in the night attracted a big crowd of little (and big) monsters, ghouls, ghosts and zombies to Little Drayton Street on Monday.

The ninth Halloween street party was organised by Cr Jane Erkens and the volunteers at The Shed with support from Heritage Community Bank, Nanango Real Estate and the Nanango Tourism and Development Association (NaTDA).

Ten trophies were handed out for the best costumes, a difficult task for the judges with so many masks leering out of the darkness.

For an idea of just how many people turned up, NaTDA prepared 435 bags of lollies and 400 ice blocks for the night, which were all snapped up.

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Halloween – or Hallow e’en (ie. Holy eve) – is the evening before the Christian celebration of All Hallows Day (All Saints Day) which honours all saints, known and unknown.

Some people believed the boundary between the spirit world and humans became blurred at this time.

In some European traditions, it was believed the dead were allowed to rise from their graves and walk the streets for one night. Lanterns were lit to guide these ghosts back to their homes for a feast.

The Christian celebration was laid on top of earlier pagan rituals marking the end of one part of the year (harvest) and the beginning of another (winter).

“Trick or treat” follows an ancient tradition of going from house to house to seek food for the dead. Turnips were carved as jack-o’-lanterns designed to scare off any evil spirits.

Americans added the pumpkins.

Kieran Dawson, from Nanango, was having double the fun with his two-headed monster costume

Claudia Mueller, from The Shed, was handing out lollies

Skye Wilson, from Nanango, was a trophy winner
Volunteers Becky Gassman, Maree Robertson and Sam Hill were preparing the ice blocks to hand out
Leah Walker, 10, from Nanango, was one of the 10 trophy winners
Cr Jane Erkens, from The Shed, has been the mover and shaker behind Nanango’s Halloween street party for almost a decade
South Burnett Deputy Mayor Gavin Jones, and councillors Danita Potter and Scott Henschen were checking out what all the Halloween fuss was about

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Ghoulish Gallery

  

 

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