I heard about Beggars Night (which is tonight) when I was a kid back in the day, but my brother and I never went out the night before Halloween. I think the principal of Lincoln Elementary school (which was torn down many years ago) told us that going out on Beggars Night was not a great idea.
Although we found stories reporting that the Beggars Night tradition got started back in 1938 and it reduced cases of criminal mischief, I can remember kids soaping windows on both Beggars Night and Halloween if they didn’t get any candy.
Tricks or treats could be interpreted in a couple of ways, but some adults expected kids to tell jokes or perform a trick before giving them a treat (tricks and treats). Des Moines Metro banned Beggars Night in 2025. Cities in other states (New York, Ohio, Texas and others) have also observed the tradition.
I found one story in which the writer, a life coach named Sarah Uchytil, said Beggars Night actually informally started in 1931 in Des Moines when some kids were getting arrested for pulling pranks. But in 1938, it formally began after Des Moines police received a record number of 550 calls about vandalism.
These days you can find scads of Halloween jokes on the web. I don’t know how old the kids are now going out on Beggars Night, but some of them could have electronic devices under their costumes to hunt for jokes just before they ring doorbells. There are scads of Halloween jokes on the web. This reminds me that I wrote a Halloween story back in 1981 and it got published in the local newspaper.
I remember when we were living in student housing back when I was in medical school and two guys taller than me with voices deeper than mine and giant lawn and leaf bags knocked on our door. I thought I noticed the odor of alcohol. It was Halloween, not Beggars Night. I gave them a few candies but must not have shown the right attitude. They threw them at the door after I closed it. I don’t know what they had against kale.
Here’s Sena’s Beggars Night joke: What did one pumpkin say to another pumpkin? How smashed are you?
Happy Beggars Night!
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