Probably the original Jack o'Lanterns were made with turnips in Ireland.
It seems the Irish immigrants brought the tradition to North America, where pumpkins were plentiful, and the Jack o'lantern was adapted to the local conditions.
Carving pumpkins is fun, but there are other vegetables that work too. My personal favourite was an extremely large zucchini we grew one year when our daughter was about twelve.
The shape made it a fantastic lizard, and we carved it out easily. Because a zucchini is so much softer than a pumpkin, the teeth turned out better than I had ever been able to do with the stiffer, more brittle flesh of pumpkins.
Happy Halloween, vegetable artists. Those who are also interested in punctuation can watch a slide show called Pumpkins love punctuation, by clicking here.
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