This story was told to me by Bobbi Solomon,
(retired teacher, Long Beach, N.Y.) in her words:

Let me see if I can remember. We were living in our first home here in Lido. It was a small ranch and the living room window was next to the front door.
My husband, who to this day has still not grown up, decided to rig a speaker attached to a microphone in our tape recorder and put the speaker inside our Jack O' Lantern who we sat on the step out side our front door. From the window we could see the children as they arrived to Trick or Treat. As they approached the door our pumpkin would say "Excuse me, would you please tell the people in the house that I'm cold?" The children were so adorable. They would bend down and talk right to the pumpkin. Of course they'd ring the bell and tell us he's cold and needs a scarf or a hat. We would play along and say, "Pumpkins can't talk". They would insist that he was in fact really speaking..
One Halloween night, a boy named Steven had a whole conversation with the pumpkin and after we gave him candy. He went home and insisted that his mother come down to see the talking pumpkin. It was dinner time and she was so busy, but Steven insisted that she leave her food on the stove and see this miraculous pumpkin.
As we saw our neighbor approaching my husband said to me , "Don't speak."
Steven commanded, "Mommy talk to him."
Of course, our pumpkin didn't say a word. His mom was livid!
She said "Steven, you made me come all the way here for nothing. I told you pumpkins can't talk."
She turned on her heels to leave, and as she got to the bottom of our walk, the pumpkin said, "Bye, Thelma."
You had to see her face!
Steven yelled, "You see, mommy, I told you he talks!"
We did this year after year, for a number of years, until it was drawing too many people from all over Long Beach. It was fun while it lasted .

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