Thanks to Jazz Age content marketing, business girls never had to sweat over throwing a nifty Halloween blow. The Bogie Book showed 'em how.
Each October from 1912 and 1926, paper party-goods maker The Dennison Paper Company published The Bogie Book to inspire busy women. (The company skipped a 1918 edition. Halloween was cancelled that year, because the nation was gripped by the Spanish Flu.)
In the 1925 edition, the two-page article, "The Business Girl's Halloween Party," offered all the instructions to plan your blow:
- Buy a Dennison Halloween "lunch set," complete with a crepe paper tablecloth, paper plates and paper napkins.
- Buy Dennison crepe paper sashes for the guys, headbands for the dolls.
- Make place cards and a table centerpiece from cardboard and Dennison crepe paper; a chandelier from wire and Dennison crepe paper; and window curtains and valances from Dennison crepe paper.
- Decorate the rest of the room with black cat cardboard cutouts from Dennison.
- For appetizers, serve pumpkin doughnuts wrapped in Dennison crepe paper; fruit cocktail in a Dennison paper cup wrapped in Dennison crepe paper; candy wrapped in Dennison crepe paper; and apples topped with Dennison crepe paper goblins' hats.
- Keep the main course simple: chicken patties and potato chips. Serve ice cream, cake and coffee for desert.
- Prepare everything a day in advance, so you can assemble it quickly when you get home from work.
As Dennison was a family-friendly firm, no instructions were included for hiding the hooch (illegal due to the Prohibition).
