Between 60,000 and 70,000 goblins, ghosts and ghouls, fur traders in canoes, human beer kegs, walking soup cans and spandex-legged superheroes roamed the streets of downtown Madison to celebrate Halloween Saturday.
The State Street Halloween crowds were the largest seen in years, easily surpassing last year's turnout estimate of 40,000, according to Madison Police Capt. George Silverwood, commander of the department's special events squad.
\The crowd was really in a very festive mood,"" Silverwood said. ""Officers thought they were quite polite.""
Police blocked off Johnson and Gorham streets to permit the crowds to move freely up and down State Street, and approximately 100 extra police officers were on hand until nearly 3 a.m. CST.
By most accounts the celebrations went off safely, with relatively few arrests and citations and only several moments of potential danger.
About one dozen people were arrested, Silverwood said, while Officer Peter Ystenes of the UW Police said the county detox unit filled up before midnight.
For the most part, however, the throngs of people were fairly calm, according to some of the evening's observers.
""We were actually pretty calm,"" said Joe Oldenburg, who tended bar at Bull Feathers, 303 N. Henry St., Saturday. Despite reported waits of more than one hour to get in the bar, ""everyone just had a good old time,"" Oldenburg said.
One of the evening's moments of greatest tension occurred outside of the Orpheum Theatre, 216 State St., where a near-stampede of people threatened to crush pedestrians, Silverwood said.
""We haven't seen that before, even years when they had bigger crowds,"" Silverwood said. ""I think we need to look into it and figure out what happened.""
The incident led Asst. Police Chief Richard Cowan to temporarily revoke the Orpheum's liquor license for the evening, according to Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4.
""The security and procedures [at the Orpheum] were just not very well done, apparently,"" Verveer said.
A second ""crush"" situation occurred in the 500 block of State Street near BW-3, 529 State St., Silverwood said.
""A number of people were being pushed against a fence,"" Silverwood said, leading police to begin ""peeling people in the other direction.\
