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Years later my wife Cindy and I moved to Winnipeg and met our good friend Randy Wall (aka MadRandall) another fan of Halloween and all things strange. Almost 25 years ago Randy started an annual Halloween house party. The party has become semi-famous and continues uninterrupted to this day. Unfortunately for the past 17 years our attendance as been sporadic since we decided to escape the horrible climate of Winterpeg by moving to the beautiful island of Bermuda. In Bermuda our Halloweening was mostly confined to pub parties on Halloween but we did discover the fun British tradition of the Fancy Dress Party. Making and wearing a costume was no longer confined to just Halloween. So for years Halloween was pretty low key. And then our friends Debbie and Hugh moved into a house with the most wonderfully strange basement. Seven separate rooms, with bare limestone block walls, as well as two connected garages (one on either end). Low hanging pipes and wiring make the space useful for only storage or a HAUNTED HOUSE. My obsession was born.
In 2004 we began work on the Haunted House near the beginning of October. We had no idea just how much work was involved in such an endeavor but we did manage to put together a decent haunted house using 4 of the available rooms. The displays were all static except for a rocking chair powered by a windshield washer motor. Even so that Haunted House was a hit and the party was a blast.
Work on the 2005 haunted house began pretty much the day after the 2004 party. Planning, learning, experimenting... Halloween pretty much became a 365 day event at our house but luckily for me my wife got into it almost as much I did (one evening I was upstairs aging a skeleton while Cindy was down stairs painting a coffin - not a bad level of strangeness for a middle-aged couple). We began assembling the haunt in August and still barely had enough time but we managed, with the help of a lot of people, to pull together a haunt that used 5 of the rooms, both garages and a separate cemetery. Plenty of static displays and props and about a dozen props or displays that were animated in some form or another. It was a hugh hit. The party was bigger and better and we added a kid's party on Halloween night - a beautiful, warm Bermuda evening with lots of TOTs and neighbours and friends touring the haunt, visiting and having fun; it so reminded of those halloweens of long ago.
When I first started making props for the haunted house I of course turned to the internet hoping to get some inspiration and help. What I found amazed me! So many people with the same love of halloween. I got so many ideas and so much helpful information from so many sources. These pages are my attempt to pay that back a bit. Maybe inspire others, maybe be just a bit of help. And of course it gives us a chance to show off. I'll add more information in time about the props and bits that we have built and will build in the future. If you find any of this useful or have any questions we would love to hear from you. Send us an email at halloween@cindybob.com
Bob