Adults Get Their Fear On With Home Haunting

Posted by Edward Mugarian in Halloween Events on April 24th, 2019

For decades, on Halloween night, hundreds of thousands of kids would take to the streets racing through their respective neighborhoods dressed in scary costumes going door-to-door to fetch candy from adults sporting lit pumpkins on porches, and blinking lights in windows.

Well…all that’s changed.

Halloween is not just for kids. Adults everywhere are transforming their yards each October into a Halloween paradise. Although pumpkins remain essential, Halloween decorations have become more elaborate now that adults have stayed a kid at heart, taking over The Night of Samhain. It used to be you bought a pumpkin, carved it and placed it on the porch. That’s it! Now, you see cobwebs on the trees, witches, zombies and tombstones in the yard, and gigantic spiders crawling on roofs, and down the facade of houses.

Call it, prolonged adolescence.

In fact, one in two Americans expect to decorate their home or yard in record numbers. According to the National Retail Federation (NRF), total spending for Halloween is expected to reach 9.1 billion in 2019, a staggering 89.6% increase from a decade ago (4.8 billion). Celebrants are expected to spend an average of $87.00, up from $48.00 in 2009. The NRF further forecasts that consumers plan to spend $3.2 billion on costumes (purchased by 68 percent of Halloween shoppers), $2.7 billion on decorations (74 percent), $2.6 billion on candy (95 percent) and $400 million on greeting cards (35 percent).

So…what’s behind the numbers?

These are the generations that grew up watching the syndicated television shows and subsequent reruns of The Addams Family, The Munster’s, The Twilight Zone, and their favorite Saturday afternoon scary movie television host. Not to mention the horror film explosions of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s that are still enormously popular today. So much so, in fact, Hollywood is churning out remakes to a whole new generation of horror film fans that can’t get enough of everything spooky and macabre. Look no further than the popularity of The Walking Dead or American Horror Story. Horror has hit mainstream, and there’s no turning back!

A great Halloween is not just about candy. Like any holiday, it’s about a shared celebration of tradition and rituals. In fact, Halloween is arguably more community-oriented than other holidays. In that civic-minded spirit, we set out on a quest to find some great neighborhoods for grassroots Halloween home haunting, where entire neighborhood streets are being shut down and collectively remodeled into Halloween fun parks and mini Haunted Villages, entertaining thousands of site seers and thrill-seekers who make the massive pilgrimage to see them. Here are just a few:

Terror on Tilson Street (Detroit, Michigan)

About an hour north of the city that put the world on wheels, lies the quaint, family friendly village of Romeo, Michigan. A small village, whose streets are populated with turn the century Victorian homes that transport you to another time.

Year-after-year tens of thousands of Michiganders flock to what’s been dubbed the “Terror on Tilson Street” to witness the state’s largest neighborhood funded haunted attraction. These residents do it up with some of the most incredible lighted displays, state-of-the-art scary props such as zombies, clowns, movie villains, graveyards, and elaborate spun spider webs. Just drop in a full moon and you have…spooky! When done, this quiet community’s boulevard is turned into a 7-day, terror filled mecca for an entire week preceding Halloween, running through the big day of October 31st, when they welcome more than 2000 kids from all over to trick-r-treat from 6-8pm.

These detailed and devilish displays, which are done entirely by the residents themselves, are being constructed the entire month of October, and are usually completed one-week prior to Halloween. However, they are available to the general public all month, day or night, to stroll past and enjoy what has become, without a doubt, an extraordinary 32 home haunted attraction.

Halloween on Hillcrest (Louisville, Kentucky)

Louisville, best known for Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby. But, what isn’t known is that Louisville is one of the best kept secrets in America when it comes to celebrating Halloween and haunted happenings. Home to the infamous haunted locations like the Waverly Hills Sanitarium, Phoenix Hill Tavern, and the Louisville Palace Theater, Louisville has chilled the spine of many professional ghost hunters and casual visitors with numerous documented supernatural sightings and occurrences.

The residents of Hillcrest Avenue “kick it up a notch” and keep the haunted tradition alive with a Halloween spook-fest of their own. Hillcrest Avenue is open the entire month of October for Halloween enthusiasts and is a go-to area for ghouls and goblins to enjoy. During the month, Hillcrest boasts an estimated 75,000+ visitors to its showcase of stunning and elaborate decorations that range from store bought to DIY designs. Many of the larger displays are themed: aliens, clowns, zombies, movies villains – all guaranteed to provide outstanding entertainment value.

Halloween on Hanover Street (Richmond, Virginia)

The emerging travel destination of Richmond, the capital of Virginia, is among America’s oldest major cities. Where Patrick Henry, a U.S. Founding Father, famously declared “Give me liberty or give me death.” Well, on All Hallows Eve it is exactly that! Death is a holiday along Hanover Street, commonly known to the locals as “Halloween Central.”

Richmond has a plethora of Haunted Happenings the entire month of October. But, Hanover Street is THE place to be on Halloween night. It’s yet another grassroots Halloween event that is more than 30 years in the making. Hanover offers plenty ghouls, spiders and skeletons and intricately stenciled pumpkins that get better each year as residents upgrade their yards in an effort to outdo each other creating an incredibly spooky visual extravaganza. On October 31st, Hanover Street is blocked off as thousands of trick-r-treaters can move safely up and down the block.

Halloween Anoka (Minneapolis, Minnesota)

It’s been dubbed the “Halloween Capital of the World.” And why not? Halloween has been a cherished tradition here since 1920, and it’s one of the first cities that pulled the “trick” out of “treat” in an effort to bring the community together in a shared celebration of civic-mindedness. Who would’ve “thunk” that a holiday, which many consider to be “evil,” is actually one that spreads civility?

For a city that boasts only 20,000 residents, it goes ALL OUT with its Halloween celebrations. In the month of October, Anoka hosts haunted houses, scarecrow competitions, costume parties and balls. In addition, there are pet costume contests, and bonfires. The town also holds not 1. Not 2. But 3 Halloween parades: a nighttime parade, a day parade for the kids, and the Grand Parade the Saturday before Halloween. If that weren’t enough, a gigantic blinking pumpkin sits atop city hall that can been seen for miles.

Halloween on Beacon Hill (Boston, Massachusetts)

When we think of Halloween in Massachusetts, we think of the small Village of Salem just 30 minutes to its’ south. But Boston has its own kind of Halloween paradise with some of the oldest graveyards, haunted tales…and, the immaculately preserved brick row houses of Beacon Hill.

Referred to as the Archer Residences of Beacon Hill, it’s the perfect balance of spooky decorations, glowing lights, perfectly carved pumpkins and outstanding cuisine, collectively assembled to create a magical Halloween experience. This well to-do boulevard of million dollar homes draws site-seers and trick-r-treaters from all around to witness the extraordinary decorations and the most lavish and colorful Halloween displays you’ll find anywhere, which are creative, beautiful and, yes, spooky!

This just a small sampling of the collective and community “spirited” home haunting that has run rampant throughout the United States. These grown up kids of decades past are celebrating BIG! Their love of Halloween has helped give rise to the 9 billion dollar per year industry it is today, second only to Christmas…and it will only get Bigger.

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Edward Mugarian

Editor of Halloween Living Magazine, and a Detroit, Michigan native. After earning a B.A. in English at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, Ed pursued opportunities in public relations and management that helped mold him personally and professionally, developing his skills in writing and editing, marketing and advertising, public speaking and media relations. As well as broadening his experience in administrative leadership. In addition, he pursued film and special effects makeup programs in both Detroit and Los Angeles and worked on set as a special effects make-up artist. His passion for being a Halloween and horror film “geek” have been a constant throughout his life - cutting his teeth on the extraordinary works of Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, H.P. Lovecraft, and the great Shirley Jackson. His youth was spent hustling through haunted houses, and seeing the latest 70’s & 80’s horror films at the midnight drive-ins and local movie houses. He's also an avid horror film and movie memorabilia collector. One could say, he's autumn over summer. Pumpkins over pineapples. Horror over drama; and wearing black over anything else.
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