What do Des Moines and Dayton have in common?

Give up? The answer is “Beggar’s Night,” a substitute for the more commonplace tradition of Halloween. While the actual celebration dates vary from location to location, cities in central Iowa, central Ohio and along the New Hampshire seacoast stand apart from the rest of the nation when it comes to the holiday. Instead of featuring night-time activity on a day associated with pranksters, they moved it forward on the calendar. And rather than have children parade from home to home begging for candy in the melodious call, “Trick or Treat,” municipalities in these areas ask youngsters to “earn” their treats by sharing riddles, jokes or other “talent.” In the Des Moines area, the rules have been in place so long that by now they’re unspoken.

What Halloween and Beggar’s Night have in common is this: the children wait until evening, then descend upon their neighborhoods costumed as angels, vampires, story-book characters and more. I still remember the year my two nephews revved up the horror-quotient: one nephew as dressed as Death and the other as Taxes.

But costume isn’t the only similarity between the practice of Halloween and Beggar’s Night. With either celebration, the kids receive candy — or pennies, floss or boxed raisins — from friendly neighbors who’ve left the porch light on as a beacon to sugar-seeking youth.

How did it all begin? Well, in central Iowa the origins of Beggar’s Night are well-documented and stemmed from the need to curb vandalism associated with Halloween. Kids these days! There’s no respect any more, right? Except that, according to the oft-published facts by The Des Moines Register, the violence reached its peak in 1938, when “Des Moines police answered a record 550 calls concerning vandalism.”

We hope this level of destruction remains a thing of the past, but it still pays to take precautions, to safeguard children collecting candy. So, before allowing anyone to head out the door, be sure to review expert tips and advice offered by the City of Des Moines. Then, brush up on those jokes and riddles.

Guest Writer: Brenda Friedrich is an Iowa-based writer and business communications consultant. You can also find her blogging at Enroute365.

The 14-mile section of interstate running through the city is typically called “Interstate Highway 235” (as designated by the DOT) or “MacVicar Freeway (as dubbed by the 1960 Des Moines City Council). But the roadway received its nickname, the “MacVicar speedway,” because of the day-to-day antics of those who travel it. Drivers like area blogger Chris Moeller.

I don’t mean to pick on Moeller who considers MacVicar an “open-track.” It’s just that he’s just quite candid about reaching 85 mph on the roadway in his Grand Prix. At least he did in the past. Construction work may have slowed him down in recent years.

MacVicar wasn’t always seen as a race track, although it seems to have come with rules all its own. Back in 1965, Des Moines Register reporter Donald Kaul described a local man’s I-235 experience in these words: “He found the
freeway’s unhurried atmosphere and the general refusal there to bow slavishly to arbitrary driving rules quite charming, almost European in character.”

But why the name “Mac Vicar?”

The roadway was named after a father and son, both John MacVicars, who held political offices within the city for a span of over 50 years. Each served terms as mayor and streets commissioner.

Currently being rebuilt, the speedway has typically seen approximately 850 collisions annually in recent years. In fact, safety is cited as the number one reason for its reconstruction. Other factors include area changes since its
design. According to its website (yes, I-235 has its own site!) the freeway was designed in the 1950s and constructed in the 1960s. BOMA Iowa puts its completion date at 1968 and credits the route with opening up growth to the western suburbs.

As construction nears completion will MacVicar drivers pick up the pace once again? For your birdseye-view of traffic along I-235, visit DM Metro Trip Guide, choose a camera from along the route, and decide for yourself!

Guest Writer: Brenda Friedrich is an Iowa-based writer and business communications consultant. You can also find her blogging at Enroute365.

Upon moving to the Des Moines area some twenty years ago, I was delighted to find a variety of new terms and expressions used here that I’d never heard elsewhere. With the addition of the Des Moines Dictionary to the Around Des Moines blog, I’d like to share them with you. Perhaps together we can uncover their origins or create new mythologies around them!

Let’s begin with the word, “squinty.” The online Miriam-Webster dictionary refers to the term as an adjective, but in central Iowa it is often a noun used to describe ground squirrels (pictured above). Perhaps I heard wrong, however. Writers at Wikipedia note that parts of the state call this rodent a “squinney.”

“Squinney” makes more sense to me. After all, the tiny creatures (five to six inches in length) have beady, little eyes; they’re not squinty at all. And, with a little imagination, I can see that “squinney” might be a combination of the words “squirrel” and “ground.”

Des Moines’ ground squirrels, by either name, are like any other found in the United States. They are small rodents and usually found near the ground where they dig underground burrows. And, like chipmunks, there is no mystery of where they store nuts and berries while out foraging. The bulging cheeks give them away!

What are ground squirrels called in your area? And what might you know about the origin of the name “squinty” or “squinney?”

Guest Writer: Brenda Friedrich is an Iowa-based writer and business
communications consultant. You can also find her blogging at Enroute365.