John Carr's Giant Jack O'Lanterns

Every year for many, many years, John Carr, a neighbor in the Federal Street neighborhood where I live has gone to farmers who grow pumpkins to compete in the Topsfield Fair to buy some of the extra pumpkins.

This year his main grower retired, and his backup grower didn't have the best year, so his pumpkins are much smaller than normal.

Nonetheless, he got the requisite five pumpkins and carved them all in a day, lit them up, and got ready to welcome a huge number of trick-or-treaters to his display.

The street is called River Street, and it is only one block long. The jack-o-lanterns will be lit and on display through the weekend, if all holds true to form.

I hope you enjoy seeing them.

Juli

(With flash.)

Halloween at the Hawthorne Hotel

More photos of John and Karen's Room here at the Hawthorne Hotel

We Love Our Guests, but ESPECIALLY John and Karen Marsicano

Every year for many, many years, John and Karen Marsicano come to Salem from Edison, New Jersey to REALLY celebrate Halloween and all of the merriment associated with it.

They bring an entire van full of decorations and decorate their room. This year it was truly over the top, and here are the photos for you to enjoy.

More tomorrow.

Juli

Hawthorne Hotel Flags of the Week ~~October 29 through November 4, 2007

October 29th ~~ Libya and Ohio
October 30th ~~ Liechtenstein and Oklahoma
October 31st ~~ Lithuania and Oregon
November 1st ~~ Luxembourg and Pennsylvania
November 2nd ~~ Madagascar and Rhode Island
November 3rd ~~ Malawi and South Carolina
November 4th ~~ Malaysia and South Dakota

Juli

Sam Adams Seasonal 4-Pack ~~ Second Place Group

Devilled Eggs ~~ Third Place Group

Mexican Day of the Dead Bride (and Groom) ~~ Third Place Individual

Frankenstein's Monster ~~ First Place Individual

The Exorcist ~~ First Place Group

Carrie, Second Place Individual

A Successful Halloween Ball -- Ship of Ghouls -- at the Hawthorne Hotel

Once again we were able to host an awesome Halloween Ball here at the Hawthorne Hotel. Tonight's costume contest entrants and winners were:

Individual:

First Place ~~ Frankenstein's Monster
Second Place ~~ Carrie
Third Place ~~ Mexican Day of the Dead Wedding Bride

Group:

First Place ~~ The Exorcist (yes, the bed, the priest and the possessed 'girl')
Second Place ~~ Sam Adams Seasonal Four-Pack
Third Place ~~ Devilled Eggs

Finalists that did not place were:

Individual:

Deli Man
Mermaid
Gorton's Fisherman
Severed Head on a Plate
Transformer
Man in the Shower
Pinnochio
Senor Cruz
Carmen Miranda
Old Master
Tooth Fairy

Group:

Merry Christmas
Wedding Party of Frankenstein
Unicorns
Old Wizard and Guardian of the Light
Mother Nature and the Four Seasons
Ghosts from the Titanic

To see photos of the entire party, go to: http://tinyurl.com/2bx6yl

The winners of the decorating contest for the Hotel departments was the Library, which was decorated by the Dining Services Department. Congratulations to James Kluge and his team!

Good night!

Juli

The Eagle Has Landed, at the Hawthorne Hotel

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you will already know that the eagle that sits atop the canopy over the front entrance has been gone for awhile to the eagle spa.

Today our eagle came home, all shiny and regilded.

Hee he or she is for all to see.

Special thanks to Michael Millman of Millman signs (the person on the left in this first photo) for his perseverance and willingness to work with us in order to get this job done. Way to go, Michael!

Juli

Autumn in Salem

This scene is one you see right outside of the Essex Street door of the Hawthorne Hotel. The base of the statue that you can just make out after the three tree trunks is of the Nathaniel Hawthorne statue, our namesake.

I thought you might enjoy this lovely New England Fall look out of our window.

Juli

A couple of bloggers comment on the Ghost Hunters Episode

about the Hawthorne Hotel.

I thought you might be interested in the links:

Ghost Hunters 3.17: "Salem"By Administrator Case #2: Hawthorne Hotel. This particular episode is an oddity for several reasons, even by the standards of the third season. It was filmed at least a year ago during the second half of 2006, yet it is being shown after the most ...John's Paranormal Blog - http://entil2001.com/blog2 .

Ghost Hunters - Hooked On A FeelingBy Joe Reality They meet Juli Lederhaus, General Manager, who is very excited and quickly gets down to business with a tour. "We've had guests who've left and won't come back," she says, taking them to the library where chairs and tables have been ...Reality TV Magazine - http://www.realitytvmagazine.com/blog

Juli

Not Every Storeroom Looks Like This, Especially in a Hotel

More Scenes Behind-the-Scenes

Unique Among Hotels

When I first came to work at the Hawthorne Hotel, I walked into an office here in the hotel one October and walked straight into a scene similar to the ones you see here.

Each department of the Hawthorne Hotel gets a room to decorate that will be part of the big party tomorrow night.

Each department manager leads the way, and their team goes shopping with a fairly substantial budget to get what they need to compete in our contest for the best-decorated room. They also go and raid our storage bins which contain all of the things we have bought to do this in prior years.

I thought these behind the scenes looks might be amusing to you as well.

In these photos you see Tom Bracken, our Assistant Controller, and Danielle Halderman, our Controller (behind the pirate).

I'll post some additional photos later.

I hope you enjoy seeing another slice of life at the Hawthorne Hotel.

Juli

and the Winner Is. . . . . (drum roll please!)

K. Thompson of New York City, who guessed 1,003 pounds for the weight of "Flat Jack" in our Guess the Weight of Our Giant Pumpkin Contest.

The actual weight is 1,008 pounds, as purchased.

We are hopeful to be able to keep Flat Jack out on display until Thanksgiving. He should last that long, we hope, depending on being protected from invasion by anything.

We had nearly 900 entries in this contest, which is interesting, because when we had a similar contest in the 80's, it drew almost an identical number of entries. In those days a giant pumpkin was around 300 pounds. Looks as though inflation has hit everything!

Anyway, Congratulations to "K" and thanks to all of you who entered this contest.

Juli