On a lonely stretch of road in Valley Township, motorists slow to a crawl as ghoulish scarecrows, witches, evil clowns and other ghastly apparitions loom out of the shadows along cornfields and through the yard of Jenny and Landol Croyle's property.
“The clowns are my favorite — and I've always liked my coffin,” Jenny said.
Jenny, 50, has been decorating the property outside her ranch house at 472 Anderson Creek Road since she and Landol moved there seven years ago. Her collection of horror gets more extensive with each Halloween.
“Halloween is my favorite holiday. I'm a big Stephen King fan,” she said. “This year, I started decorating at the beginning of September, and I'm still working on it.”
Most of her supplies come from yard sales and flea markets. While living at her former home in Brackenridge, she bought the casket for next to nothing at a warehouse flood sale.
That first Halloween after her casket purchase, she hid inside its satin-lined interior and lunged out at unsuspecting trick-or-treaters.
“Even the adults ran away and wouldn't come back,” she said. “Now, I'm scared to get in it because of the spiders.”
After a recent blustery day, Jenny moved through the trees near the edge of her property, stepping among the handmade tombstones. She secured the stakes on the figures of a rabid rabbit devouring a hunter, on the ZZ Top ghoul strumming his guitar and the Ronald Reagan monster that she picked up for a buck one year at a flea market.
She invents many of her creepy displays and gets help putting them up from her husband, sister and friends.
“I let my imagination go wild,” she said.
But sometimes, her imagination can turn on her, giving her the chills in her own backyard.
“I store all the stuff in the barn and sometimes out of the corner of my eye, I'll catch sight of one of the dummies and get a scare,” she said.
The Croyles don't host any open house events inside their home but enjoy watching the line of motorists slowing along the road to view the creepy scene.
“I'll look out and see a good 10 to 15 cars starting to slow down. I just enjoy seeing the people come by,” she said.
Brigid Beatty is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. She can be reached at 724-543-1303 or bbeatty@tribweb.com.
