Halloween's hard work

As sisters and Cape Girardeau Parks and Recreation volunteers Alicia and Angela Broshuis walked through the Haunted Hall of Horror at the Arena Building the night before it opened last week, it was apparent the horrors had not yet reached scream-inducing proportions.

In the morgue, a bottle of red RIT dye sat atop a sink containing fake body parts, and while walking along one corridor Alicia picked up a stray severed hand that somehow found its way to the floor.

But there were also glimpses of the scary moments that lay ahead for the 4,000 to 5,000 people that will walk through the hall over the six days it is open.

Walking through the basement level of the Arena Building can be scary enough without coming across an electric chair awaiting its victim and a room recalling "The Ring" set up with a television and a photograph of the nightmare-inducing little girl from the film.

Construction of the Hall of Horror began Oct. 18 with help from about 20 volunteers and workers from the Department of Parks and Recreation, Southeast Missouri State University and the maintenance crew from the Arena Building and the Shawnee Center.

"I didn't know it was as detailed as it is," said recreation coordinator Michelle Fitzgerald, who was experiencing her first year working on the Hall of Horrors.

The Hall of Horrors is between 800 and 1,000 square feet in size and takes 20 to 30 minutes to walk through. It has been growing in size every year since it started in 1992, said Scott Williams, the department's recreation supervisor.

Williams and his wife, Penny, created the hall, which has become the largest special event the department offers, thinking it would offer an activity older children and adults could enjoy.

"It started out conservatively, with just the main floor and one basement," Williams said. "From there, every year we've challenged ourselves."

This year the maze-like corridors on the main floor are divided up and the area behind the arena building's stage is used.

Sections of the corridors are decorated according to different themes, such as "Children of the Corn," "Phantom of the Opera" and your less-than-friendly clowns.

Department workers and all the volunteers gather about a week before construction to discuss ideas and decide who will work on what.

Scott City High School junior and department volunteer Josh Middleton created the "Devil Room," complete with a throne fit for his satanic majesty and enough red to make you see the fires of hell.

"It's a pretty cool job," Middleton said.

Middleton and other volunteers will also be busy while the Hall of Horrors is open. They will dress up as certain characters or lie in wait to jump out and scare people. It's something the volunteers look forward to. They have meetings to discuss the best ways to scare people.

"We feed off the other employees," Angela Broshuis said.

Fitzgerald will not be sharing in the fun of working inside the hall of horrors because of her pregnancy but has enjoyed her first year working on its construction.

"It's like bringing back your inner child," she said.

Into the woods

To reach the Black Forest Villages' Haunted Ghost Town, which opened Friday and concludes its run this weekend, visitors must travel narrow gravel roads in a wooded, secluded area four miles north of Cape Girardeau.

Owner Greg Macke is well aware of the village's Halloween appeal.

"Being out in the woods is a scary-type atmosphere anyway," he said. "We had people come in and get in line and say that just the drive in was scary."

With no lights from the city interfering, the village can also get very dark at night, but while the ghost town is open there will be some light provided by a bonfire.

Near the bonfire is where people must wait for their tour guide, the Grim Reaper.

Two days before its opening, however, the village did not resemble a ghost town as much as a construction site. Macke walked around with a tool belt slung around his hips as he toured the nine rooms in the part of the village known as the boardwalk and the village's barn, which normally houses the reception and picnic area.

The barn is home to maze-like corridors covered in black plastic that cover the wood framing underneath. It has been two weeks since Macke and eight volunteers, mostly family and friends, started constructing the ghost town. Macke began designing the layout on paper about a month before.

This is the fifth year for the ghost town, and its construction has turned into a family bonding time for the Mackes.

Macke's wife, Darla, and her sister, Diane Abernathy, design all the rooms in the haunted village while Greg and Diane's husband, John, work on the building side of things.

Most of the Mackes' six children take part as well. Their 5-year-old son got started last year when he was one of the Grim Reaper tour guides. "He started learning to scare people at 4 years old," Greg Macke said with some pride.

As with the people working at the Hall of Horrors, scaring people is serious fun for Macke and his crew.

"The fun part is scaring big guys," Macke says while walking through a maze containing more than 300 bales of hay. "If we can get a big, burly guy to jump back, they think we're doing our job. We get to be like kids, big kids out here."

kalfisi@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 182