Kansas City Missouri to Jacksonville Florida Halloween Postcard Cover 1908

Halloween's modern imagery, featuring witches, bats, and the full moon, draws from a complex tapestry of historical beliefs and practices. The figure of the witch, often depicted flying on a broomstick under a nocturnal sky, evolved from earlier European folklore and beliefs about malevolent figures, gaining particular prominence during the early modern witch hunts. By the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as Halloween transformed from its Celtic Samhain roots into a more secular holiday, the witch was largely reinterpreted as a whimsical, albeit still spooky, icon.