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Originally, the Irish and English would carve scary faces on turnips, beets and potatoes and place them in windows to frighten wandering evil spirits on Halloween.

When they immigrated to America, they started carving pumpkins (a fruit native to America) and found they were much better suited for Jack o Lanterns.
The Irish when they came to the colonies brought the story with them of Jack of the Lantern. The story goes that Jack was a very bad boy and the devil consigned him to carry a lantern with a lump of coal for the rest of his days. This story was told to children to tell them what happened to bad boys and girls. In Ireland they used turnips, but began to use pumpkins that were growing in the New World.

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11y ago

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