Haunted

Welcome to Epoch Arts Haunted House. Before entering, I need to lay down some ground rules. Our actors will not touch you - do not touch them. Anyone found mistreating our actors in any way will be escorted from the Haunted House by someone much scarier than anyone you'll find inside. Do not use your cell phone or any other device to take photos or video of our Haunted House or to light your way through our Haunted House. Our creatures like it dark in there, and we wouldn't want to upset them... any more than they already are. You will enter the Raven's Nest, meander through the Corn Maze, partake in a little Farm to Table, and perhaps buy a souvenir at the Creepyhollow Souvenir Shop. Don't worry - you don't need any money ... although it may cost you your head. Please stay together as a group as you make your way through the Haunted House - we wouldn't want to lose anyone...again. Enter: The Harvest.

And so it began ... over one hundred times over the course of two Friday and two Saturday nights in October. Fifty or so youth, ages eleven through eighteen ... and a nine year old who wore down the director over the course of the past six years in order to gain a part in Haunted ... and a few young and not quite so young adults put together this amazing experience. Room leaders and cast members gathered donations to pay for room supplies, and did the work of designing the room, putting up walls and curtains, putting together costumes, scripting, decorating, and lighting their rooms. Many room leaders spent many hours, several days a week on top of the scheduled two hours on Sunday afternoons, doing the hard work it took to get their rooms ready for opening day. In addition, the queen of the zombies did a lot of work recruiting the largest cast of zombies ever featured as part of the zombie hayride, as well as doing costuming for all of the undead. Add in make-up artists, ticket sellers, hayride drivers and followers, parents and youth who baked goodies for the cafe - and people who sold them, and around a hundred people were involved in this haunted adventure. 

The work everyone, especially room leaders and artistic directors put in was astounding. The end product was lauded as the best haunted house in the state by many who experienced it. I am honored to have been a part of something so extraordinary.

If you missed it, you'll have to wait until next year ... and it's sure to be good, as the room leaders have already started planning rooms for Haunted 2018!