Open Knowledge - Halloween link round-up

The year I did the Dead Ancestor party for Halloween I was searching the net for pictures of "dead ancestors" and discovered to my shock and horror that it used to be common to paint portraits and/or take pictures of the recently deceased to memorialize them. That just seems .... i dunno. I don't want to say "wrong" because I'm sure it comes from good intentions. But it does seem a little creepy.

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Yeah, it seems creepy to me too. I wonder how expensive photography was back then? Maybe few could justify the expense unless it was a significant event -- marriage, death. A picture at death may have been the only thing they had to remember someone by.

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yep that's exactly it. Because portraits and photography were so expensive people could only do it for major life events.

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Hmm, I should see if we still have pictures of the abortion pumpkin my mom and I made a few years ago. Big ol' pumpkin lying on it's side, bottom carved out with seeds and guts spilling all over the place, baby pumpkin half in and half out with a coat hanger hooked through it.

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Ooh, that sounds awesome. I hope you find it.

Another awesome pumpkin:

http://www.evilmadscientist.com/article.php/CylonOLantern

And the mother lode:

http://www.extremepumpkins.com/conwin05.html

P.S.

A comic for you:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/11338642@N00/283561915/

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