One More Week...

Photo courtesy of Everything's Halloween.

Just one more week until the start of October and the beginning of another creepy Countdown To Halloween Cemetery celebration! I'm all ready to go with a ton of posts for the entire month, so check back daily for the black-and-orange blog blowout. The party starts here promptly on October 1st. Don't be late...

Only 36 more days until Halloween. Are you ready?

  

Great Pumpkin Project Drop #1

I've been a big fan of the Great Pumpkin Project for many years, usually contributing at the end of the season with my annual pumpkin dumps. The idea of spreading Halloween jack-o-lantern fun with a little mischief added in hits dead center in my wheelhouse! So this year, I decided to do a little more...

Alongside my continuing tradition of the pumpkin dump, I decided to add a few extra jack-o-lantern drops throughout the season to spread a bit more Halloween cheer.

Last night was the first drop of the season...

I covertly dropped tagged jack-o-lantern number one into a small, old cemetery on the other side of town. Quiet, yet highly visible from the elementary school directly across the street. The central obelisk tombstone in the cemetery made a perfect backdrop with its "Father & Son" epitaph, as this pumpkin was also a father & son project.

I did the carving of the face my 10-year-old son created.

Long live the Great Pumpkin Project! More drops coming soon...

  

#pumpkindump2020

For the fourth year in a row, I was able to sneak out and get creative with my jack-o-lanterns after the Halloween celebrations. Back in 2017, I decided that I wanted to do something different instead of simply tossing them into the trash, and ended up covertly setting them up in a local metropark to much surprise and joy...

Two years ago, I again found a unique, highly-visible area in a local cemetery and was able to set up another display, remaining undetected. It was such a success, I even had friends taking photos of the set-up without even knowing who was responsible for it!

Last year, my new home opened up a vast expanse of new Pumpkin Dump locations, and I found the perfect sliver of rot nestled into a dense, overcrowded packing of retail expanse. It became a nice little social commentary on overdevelopment. Sticking a pumpkin-flavored tongue out to the oblivious hordes traveling in and out of the area.

For 2020, I decided that I was going to go much more low key. I immediately had a nice, quiet location off the main roads in mind. A place with a low chance of getting caught, but a place where the pumpkins would probably remain for quite some time.

I got up early on a frosty Saturday morning, loaded up all 13 pumpkins from this year’s Halloween display, and set out for my location, Coddingville Cemetery. Upon arriving, I scanned the area. Not a soul around. This old cemetery was in a mostly rural area and the locals hadn’t started their day yet.

I quickly set up each pumpkin, grabbed my camera, snapped a few shots of the display, and quietly slipped away undetected. The perfect Pumpkin Dump to end a great Halloween season.

Please enjoy my submission to The Great Pumpkin Project, the Highbury Cemetery Pumpkin Dump 2020…

The Miller Family Cemetery at Stoney Hill - Bath, Ohio

So I decided to do another Cemetery Sundays post. I didn't have much time, so I finally decided to check this little gem that is located a quick 5 minute bike ride from my house off the list.

I have been wanting to check out the Miller Family Cemetery at Stoney Hill for a LONG time. It's a small little cemetery nestled just off of one of the busiest roads in my town. In fact, if you didn't know about it, you (like the hundreds of other cars that drive by daily) would completely miss it.

It's a small cemetery comprised mostly of Hopkins and Miller family graves from the mid- to late-1800s. These families were the earliest settlers to the area in the early 1800s, and donated this land for a family cemetery. And although there aren't many graves here, the well-maintained cemetery has many old tombstones with wonderfully ornate epitaphs and designs. Perfect for my project! 

And something unique to this cemetery is that the groundskeepers took the older, broken stones and put them back together, setting them flat in concrete slabs for preservation. An interesting and unique way to save the historic old stones.

So sit back enjoy a quick trip through the Miller Family Cemetery at Stoney Hill...

Pumpkins In The Cemetery

Back in November, I successfully completed my second annual Pumpkin Dump. That is, instead of simply throwing all of my jack-o-lanterns away after Halloween, I decided to do something a bit more creative with them.

I found a unique, visible location in my area to quickly and secretly set up all my jack-o-lanterns! My reasoning was twofold: first, it was a fun and innocent way to extend the Halloween season by a little bit and share it with everyone who discovered the set up, and two, after removing all wax and other contaminants, it provided a natural snack for the local deer, raccoon, chipmunk and squirrel population.

My second pumpkin dump was a great success, staying up at the front of a cemetery on a highly-traveled road for the better part of three weeks. Plenty of time to be seen by many, many people...

Fast forward to this week when I receive an email from a friend, showcasing his latest collection of photography. Amongst the collection of amazing rusty industrial photos and beautiful shots of local wildlife is a photo that caught me completely off-guard...

Photo courtesy of David Fitzgibbons.

Boom! There it was! A totally awesome photo of my last pumpkin dump! It was a bigger success than I had anticipated. I don't think he even knew the story behind this or who set it up (although he may have been able to guess)!

In my quick setup and getaway, I only snapped a couple of quick daytime photos before slipping away undetected. But he obviously had more time to capture the setup in a detailed way. The selective orange coloring only amplifies the utter coolness of this photo. It is, without a doubt, the best photo of my "work"...

I was so excited when I saw it, I immediately revealed the backstory and asked his permission to post it here, so thank you Dave! You have captured the eerie fun in a way that I couldn't, and provided a most unexpected surprise!

I see a freelance photography gig in your future, say next October? Amazing shot, sir!!

  

Closed Casket Home Haunt, 2018

In going back through the all the years that I have been writing this blog, I realized that one thing has always been missing. And that is any photos showing off anyone else's haunts in the Northeast Ohio area. Which is crazy, because there are SO MANY incredible displays!

The reason, of course, is that I'm always too busy trying to get my own haunt ready to go, and I always run out of time. Always.

But somehow, this year, I actually made time to go visit one. On the Saturday before Halloween, I got to go visit the small yard haunt that was put on by Dave over at Closed Casket Studios and his surly crew. I have only been trying to go see it the last three or four years without luck. But on this rainy, dreary night I finally made good. I grabbed a six of pumpkin beer and headed over to their shindig.

(Technically, I "saw" Dave's first yard haunt way back in 2009, the first time I met him. Unfortunately, as I wrote about it then, we made it just AFTER the local Fire Marshall visited and shut the haunt down for not meeting fire code. We still laugh about that today!)

I arrived to a rain-soaked, empty neighborhood. The bad weather had gotten them and their trick-or-treat fizzled out. Luckily everyone was still there, in high spirits. I quickly joined, but not before touring the haunt display itself and snapping away with my camera.

And even though the weather sucked, the haunt still looked great. Fantastic lighting and props, adorned with killer Closed Casket Studios prop heads and hands. There was a lot of great detail tucked into a small cemetery setup.

I'm really happy that I finally had the chance to check this haunt out. It was a welcome break in my otherwise hectic schedule leading up to Halloween night, and it gave me some inspiration for some new prop ideas for next year. From here on out, I'm going to block off time to visit at least one other haunt in the area during each Halloween season. And who knows, maybe even get in some guest acting! I think this is a big part of the haunt community that I have been neglecting...

(And yes, Randy Skalos, next year I'm absolutely, positively visiting you!! The fourth time will be the charm!!)