Trick or Treat

[Dave Wilton]

>         How old is "trick or treat"?  It seems to have been
> universally observed in the United States by the 1950s.
> According to Nicholas Rogers, Halloween:  From Pagan Ritual
> to Party Night (reviewed in the most recent New York Times
> Review of Books), it was introduced in the U.S. only about
> 1939.  It must have spread rapidly.
>
>         The OED takes "trick or treat" back only to October
> 1947.  I can antedate that slightly.  This case doesn't say
> which Halloween was involved, but it necessarily was before 1947:
>
>         >>It was Halloween and spirits walked. Little
> children were eager, excited, and gay, and their oldsters
> joined in the merriment. Little Dorothy and her sister Betty,
> age seven, were enjoying the childish sport of 'trick or
> treat' among the neighbors of the Burtons in the city of Los
> Angeles.<<
>
> Burton v. Los Angeles Ry. Corp., 79 Cal.App.2d 605, 608, 180
> P.2d 367, 368 (Cal.App. 2 Dist. May 12, 1947).

I found an Oct 1941 citation, a poem in the _Saturday Evening Post_ titled
"Trick or Treat." There is also a 30 Oct 1937 _SEP_ cover illustration (by
Robert B. Velie, not Rockwell) titled "Trick or Treaters." But neither the
UC nor the Berkeley public library have this issue, so I can't verify if
that illustration title is from 1937 or was assigned later.