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From: dipper@utastro.UUCP (Debbie Byrd)
Newsgroups: net.astro
Subject: StarDate:
Message-ID: <11@utastro.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 31-Oct-85 02:00:24 EST
Article-I.D.: utastro.11
Posted: Thu Oct 31 02:00:24 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 3-Nov-85 10:29:43 EST
Organization: U. Texas, Astronomy, Austin, TX
Lines: 32

Happy Halloween!  We'll tell you why Halloween is an astronomical
holiday-- right after this.

October 3l  Halloween

Believe it or not, our celebration of Halloween has its origins in
astronomy -- in the movement of the Earth around the sun.  Halloween is
the fourth and final cross-quarter day for the year.  These are days
that lie about midway between a solstice and an equinox.  In the case
of Halloween, and the other cross-quarter days, the dates aren't exact
-- since people used to be less precise than we are about the dates for
the solstices and equinoxes.

There are three other cross-quarter days -- all associated with
holidays.  The first one is Candlemas, February 2nd -- called Groundhog
Day in America.  The second is May l, or May Day.  The third is August
l, with its early harvest festival called Lammas.

The most sinister of the four cross-quarter days is Halloween.  That's
got to be because the days are now growing shorter and the nights
longer -- with no relief in sight until the solstice on December 2l --
the day the sun makes its lowest arc across the sky visible from the
northern hemisphere.  On Halloween, witches and ghosts supposedly prowl
around until midnight -- when good spirits arrive to get rid of them.

The moon is a few days past full now -- and it won't rise until
mid-to-late-evening.  So if you're out prowling about early this
evening -- you'll have a dark night for it.  The brightest light in the
sky will be the planet Jupiter -- until moonrise.

Script by Deborah Byrd.
(c) Copyright 1984, 1985 McDonald Observatory, University of Texas at Austin