Story and photo by Gaby Miciano
Throughout the years Kansas City has seen the productions for halloween flourish. You always used to see the typical dressing up for parties or transforming homes into haunted houses and now buildings are being turned into horror houses and scare fests. People all over KC have not only started to run their own real life haunted houses but hired scare cast and employes to add extra effects. Full Moon Productions opened their first house in The Twelfth Street Bridge Historic West Bottoms District, in 1975. Named ‘The edge of hell’, which is a converted five story warehouse that includes things such as slides, vampires, demons, 20 foot anaconda, and more. The five floors are constantly being reinvented with new scenes and cast. It’s known to be the granddaddy for being the first large-scale haunted house in the country. With The Beast opening shortly after in 1991 they became ranked among the best in the US with new changes being made over the years. Both now include exquisite sets, realistic makeup and costumes, animations, holograms, and transportation of cast. Around 300 scare cast, ticket takers, and other employes have been hired to further the production. The beast is ranked 13 in the nations and takes a total of 40 minutes to venture through. It includes a werewolf forest, scarers and ¼ acres in the pitch black.
Another attraction around KC is the Worlds of Fun Halloween haunt. Along with all the rides open during the Haunt, there are 9 haunted houses that are open from 7:30 P.M. to 1:00 A.M. Each haunted attraction has it’s own theme and different scarers. Asylum Island features Lakeside Mental Hospital where the “Inmates have taken over.” Blood on Bayou includes troubled spirits and mindless demons that possess souls as they trudge through murky bogs up around the cursed mansion. Bloodshed where Old MacDonald’s farm has turned into a massacre. People in the corn where evils lurk through Corn Stalkers. In London Terror you pass through time in the streets of London where villains terrorize townsfolk. Those are just a few of the 9 that send chills down your back. These haunted houses have become a yearly tradition and happen to be what most people look forward to around halloween.
