By Onnie Stone
ST. CHARLES – The Village of the Living Dead had a busy, charitable night on Friday, Oct. 6.
A group of college students from Delta and SVSU waited in a line stretching alongside the haunted house. The four friends come to the attraction every year. “I like the jumpscares,” Shea Lauwers said. “They’ve got really cool decorations on the inside too.”
The haunted house fully immerses patrons with smells, lights, and sounds as they travel from room to room. Starting with a coffin ride that leads into a crawl-space, scare actors usher people through a maze of rooms filled with scary props and special effects.
Fans of optical illusions will love the strobe lights and spinning tunnel that will leave you feeling dizzy and disoriented. Scare actors hide in shadows and trap people in corners as they move through the haunted house.
A tour bus for the local rock music station Z-93’s annual Haunted House Bus Tour was parked outside the attraction. The tour’s first stop was at the Village of the Living Dead, unloading a bus-load of contest winners ready for a night of haunted houses.
Unfortunately, the tour bus broke down outside of the haunted house. Instead of wasting time waiting on the anchored bus, some members of the bus tour filed out to go through the haunted house for a second time.
“This was a great haunted house,” Sara Kulka, a winner of the Z-93 Haunted House Bus Tour contest said. Kulka went into the St. Charles haunted house with a couple of friends for a second round of scares.
The St. Charles Haunted House Association is a non-profit organization that prioritizes donating to the St. Charles community. The Village of the Living Dead is the main event for this association. The Delta Collegiate spoke with Ryan Mead, vice-president of the St. Charles Haunted House Association.
“Come out, it’s a good time. And you’re supporting a very good cause and really giving back to the community (by) coming through and continuing to come through,” Mead said. After operating costs, profits go to different organizations and grants. Much of the profits are also donated to the local school district.
Being a non-profit, the haunted house is completely run by volunteer efforts. “We’re nothing without our volunteers,” Mead said. A majority of the scare actors that volunteer at the Village of the Living Dead are high school students. “If at ever you are at all interested in becoming a part and trying it out our doors are open,” Mead said. “We’re always looking for volunteers.”
This year, the Village of the Living Dead is open from Sept. 29 to Oct. 31. Tickets for entry are $15 each. For an additional $3 you can experience a “coffin ride” with a real coffin waiting for you just inside the ticket booth.
Closer to the holidays, the Village of the Living Dead will open its doors once again for the St. Charles Parade of Lights. During last year’s Parade of Lights, the haunted house took on a Christmas theme adding scary figures like Krampus to its team. The entry price was $5 or five cans of non-perishable food items. All of the money was donated to Covenant Hospital, and the food was donated to the local Lutheran food bank.
