Halloween or All Hallow’s Eve, the day before All Saint’s Day hasn’t always been celebrated by the wider Australian population but the Scots and the Irish have long acknowledged Halloween, for its ancient Celtic and/or pagan festivities.
The first evidence of Halloween celebrations in Australia were around 1858, in the Victorian goldfields in Castlemaine (Mount Alexander) with a Scottish Ball celebrating Halloween.
The first evidence we could find for Gympie region, was from around the 1890’s.
In 1893, these cheeky little adverts were sneakily placed all around other general advertisements on page 2 of The Gympie Times on 19 August 1893. It was held on the evening of Thursday, 26 October, 1893.
Read the rest of the article about the Presbyterian Fancy Fair here
On 31 October 1895, The Gympie Times published this general article on Halloween:
Jumping forward to 1910, the Gympie and District Caledonian Society held a meeting to arrange observing Halloween festivities.
The CWA Young Set celebrated with a Halloween Ball in 1947……
Happy Halloween!
Gympie Regional Memories 