NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Every year, it's so much fun to meet the people who make that extra effort to make Halloween so great.
So, I figured, why don't we go through the NewsChannel 5 archive and pull a few stories of the kings and queens of Halloween from Nashville's past?
First up is 1993. For more than 30 years, the costume and make-up shop Performance Studios was the name of Halloween for Nashville. A 1993 piece came four years after its launch. They were on Church Street. They could get you everything from the unique to the big costume of the year.
"Aladdin costumes, I have a sneaking idea the Beverly Hillbillies will be popular," a worker for Performance Studios told NewsChannel 5 in 1993. "The Flintstones will be popular. The Munsters. The Addams Family."
Let's go back some more. It's hard to explain it, but an 80s Halloween is especially great.
The lore around the Bell Witch was bringing visitors to the cave in Adams.
"I heard a table rattlin'," a kid said in a NewsChannel 5 interview. "Somebody kicked it!"
"Who?" the reporter is heard asking.
"The Bell Witch!"
It's this era, 1987 to be exact, there was a visit with John Porter Gunter. I like this story.
"Kinda do colors and everything, mix 'em together, find out what you'd like to draw," Gunter said in the story, painting a pumpkin.
Gunter was the produce manager for a grocery store in Rutherford County for more than twenty years. He had a stroke in 1985 and was painting pumpkins outside the store for therapy.
"I had to learn how to talk all over again," he said. "Hard to do, but I did make it."
"It makes me calm down," he continued, speaking between painting the pumpkins.
He could paint anything. There were Ghostbusters and cartoon characters painted on his pumpkins. His most popular one? The California Raisins. I mean, it was 1987, after all.
People loved what Gunter could give them.
"I just think it's so clever, don't you think?" a customer smiled.
That's just it. We've got a long history of people around here who just know how to make Halloween grand.
Do you have a positive, good news story? You can email me at forrest.sanders@newschannel5.com.
We're just days away from Halloween. This year, Americans are expected to spend around 12 billion dollars on candy, costumes and decorations. Over the last few years, it seems many more people are going all out on decorating their homes. Forrest Sanders had the chance to visit several mid-state communities to check out some of those Halloween decorations.
-Lelan Statom
