Become a Member ![\\"snopes](\\"/design/images/logo-main.png\\"/) Search My Profile Logout Submit a Rumor Latest Trending News & Politics Entertainment Fact Checks Quiz Sections Latest Trending Fact Checks News Collections More Contact Us Submit a Rumor Archives Quiz FactBot Newsletters About Us Categories News & Politics Entertainment Science & Technology Lifestyle Free accounts support our journalism Become a Member Login My Profile Logout ![\\"republican_symbol\\"](\\"/design/images/republican_symbol.png\\"/) Snopes fact-checked the vice presidential debate live! Read more here ![\\"democrat_symbol\\"](\\"/design/images/democrat_symbol.png\\"/) Fact Check # 1962 Halloween Massacre ## Image purportedly documents a masked partygoer who fatally stabbed seven people with a kitchen knife on Halloween 1962. ### David Mikkelson ### Published Oct. 19, 2014 ![\\"](\\" Image courtesy of Shutterstock Claim: Photograph shows a masked partygoer who killed seven people on Halloween 1962. Rating: False About this rating The annual celebration of Halloween is typically associated with symbols of murder, mayhem, and madness, but of the playful show variety — celebrants don\'t generally engage in those behaviors, but rather act them out with costumes and props in the name of good, safe, spooky fun. One online purports to chronicle a gruesome, decidedly non-playful Halloween incident, though — the tale of a black-masked reveler who killed seven people with a kitchen knife at a costume party on Halloween night of 1962 and fled the scene, never to be identified, captured, or brought to justice: Advertisement: ![\\"\\"](\\" Advertisement: This image, too, is nothing more than a bit of fun, however; a terrorific fictional backstory tacked on to an otherwise ordinary vintage Halloween photograph. No such murders were reported anywhere in the U.S. on Halloween of 1962, and the story has too many logical holes in it to be plausible: If the killer \"locked all the doors [to the room] from the outside,\" how did he get into the room to stab his victims (or get back out of the room afterwards)? If his intent was to slaughter everyone present, why did he stop after killing only seven people? (Clearly he wasn\'t subdued and captured, since he was reportedly \"never caught.\") How could the FBI definitively know that a mask found seven years later was the very same one worn by the perpetrator of that massacre back in 1962? What this image actually documents is that back in the days before mass- produced, store-bought costumes became the prevalent form of Halloween garb, people donned all sorts of unusual (and often homemade) outfits for the occasion, many of which look disturbingly creepy to modern viewers. This photograph hails from that time and is similar to a number of other vintage Halloween pictures from that era. ### By David Mikkelson David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994. ## Article Tags Halloween Recommendations Advertisement: ![\\"Snopes.com\\"](\\"/design/images/logo-main.png\\") Company About Us FAQs Contact Us Submit a Topic Navigate Home Search Archive Newsletters Random Sections Latest Top Fact Checks News Account Join Login Game FactBot Like Us on Facebook Follow Us on Twitter © 1995 - 2024 by Snopes Media Group Inc. This material may not be reproduced without permission. Snopes and the Snopes.com logo are registered service marks of Snopes.com Terms of Use Privacy Policy DMCA Policy
Photograph shows a masked partygoer who killed seven people on Halloween 1962