News stories about Halloween from the late 19th and early 20th centuries in Chico don’t mention anything about trick-or-treating. Instead it is all parties and pranks. The parties were put on by families and churches, and featured fall decorations (lots of pumpkins and cornstalks), games like apple bobbing, and treats. Even Annie Bidwell got into the spirit and hosted a party for her teenage guest, Harriet Alexander, and Harriet’s young friends. I’ve written about that party before.

Annie’s party was fun, but decidedly decorous. The pranks were anything but.

The prank mentioned most often was the unhinging of gates and depositing them elsewhere. Other popular bits of casual vandalism were switching signs, depositing rubbish on porches, and stuffing chimneys with sacks, as reported in this story from 1907. The pranksters were mostly boys and young men, with girls sometimes joining in the fun.

The Normal students were the students at Chico State, then a teacher’s college, or “normal” school. John Bidwell was not amused. He wrote in his diary in 1899, “Last night being Halloween the Normal students cut up shamefully.” But sometimes they needed to blow off some steam, and that’s how they did it back in the day.