Hi JH; yes, that fits with what we saw on the History Channel last night. It talked about how it originated with the Celts. They showed a modern-day pagan ritual that made me laugh out loud; then they showed a fundamentalist Christian saying why his church was against the holiday, which also made me laugh out loud, until they showed the "haunted house" the church had: full of scenarios of people suffering for eternity due to various sins--then I stopped laughing abruptly. (NOTE: I am not inviting a religious debate, here. If anyone wants to know why I laughed, or has any comment, please PM me.)
The show went on to say that the Puritans in what was to become the U.S. were dead-set against it, because they associated it with Catholicism and the Church of England. But some of the southern states, primarily Virginia, had been settled by people of these 2 faiths, and so Halloween was kept alive here, and had some of the same things we have today, such as costumes and bobbing for apples. Oh, that reminds me: I was grateful to the pagan guy for explaining that the apple was the ancient sacred symbol of the harvest; the link I put above left me in the dark, on that. Then the show went on to where your message started, John, with the influx of Irish bringing the celebration and fun with them. They had been carving turnips, but found pumpkins much easier.