A spike-covered dune buggy shoots coal sparks into the air as it weaves through a field. A lifesize tugboat, enrobed in moss and barnacles, sinks to the bottom of the ocean in a haunted fisherman’s village. Fourteen-foot-tall jack-o-lantern men lurch and leer in the twilight. These spine-chilling sights are just a few of the spectacles at Headless Horseman Hayrides and Haunted Attractions in Ulster Park, whose lifelike spectres would make Washington Irving turn in his grave.
“Years ago, farmers would put you in the back of a pickup truck and drive through the cornfields in the dark,” says Headless Horseman owner Michael Jubie, who started the attraction with his wife, Nancy, in 1993. “There was nobody out there scaring you. It was just scary in itself. Now, people want Hollywood quality.”
Haunted houses and their demonic ilk have been around in some form or another since Madame Tussaud’s original wax museum debuted in London in 1835. By the 1930s, they had become a common Halloween season attraction, mostly put on as fundraisers by local service clubs like the Rotary or Jaycees. Oh, how times have changed.
Today’s for-profit horror entertainment industry is a multibillion-dollar machine. Since 1977, nine of the top 20 most-profitable films by return on investment have been horror movies, and last month’s release of the latest installment in the Conjuring franchise has already grossed over $400 million, smashing the previous record for a horror film’s opening weekend. On the attractions side of things, trade group American Haunts estimates that there are over 1,200 haunted houses, rides, and amusement park events in the US, bringing in $300 to $500 million annually in ticket sales alone.
These trends find fertile ground in the Hudson Valley, where Headless Horseman and many other haunted attractions welcome visitors from across the country every autumn who are seeking out increasingly immersive, adrenaline-fueled experiences of the murderous and macabre.
“The legendary Headless Horseman Hayrides, named America’s number one haunted attraction with well over one million guests, is a cornerstone of this seasonal success,” says Lisa Berger, Ulster County tourism director. “Haunted houses, historic ghost tours, and festive celebrations in our small towns boost local businesses, from restaurants and shops to hotels and breweries. Halloween in Ulster County isn’t just fun—it’s a powerful driver of our tourism economy.”
Producing Hollywood-Quality Scares
Kevin McCurdy’s Haunted Mansion, recognized as one of the Hudson Valley’s first for-profit haunted houses, was founded in 1977 by Kevin McCurdy when he was just 15 years old. In its 49 seasons, the Wappingers Falls attraction has developed a cult-favorite reputation for its intimate atmosphere and a commitment to traditional stagecraft that has helped nurture many crew members along their journey to careers in the professional theater and film industry.
“We’re theater people,” says Holly Dillon, who, with McCurdy, co-owns ImaginArts Studio, the company that runs the Haunted Mansion in partnership with Dutchess Parks. “People know that if they come here, we’re open to being creative.”
After founding the haunted attraction as a teen, McCurdy honed his professional skills in set design during the 80s on Broadway shows such as “Phantom of the Opera” and “Into the Woods.” In the 90s, he and Dillon founded ImaginArt Studios, which, in addition to running the Haunted Mansion, does theme design and custom fabrication work for amusement parks, museums, hotels, restaurants, and more.
Every autumn, they transform 11 acres of Poughkeepsie’s Bowdoin Park into a 40-minute, narrative-driven haunted journey that prioritizes one-on-one interactions between the almost 35 seasonal cast members (composed of a mix of professionals and volunteer horror enthusiasts) and the small groups of 10 visitors they welcome in at a time.
Each year has a different theme and different story to go along with it. (This year, the story centers on “The Keeper,” a mysterious figure who lives in the back of a movie theater).
McCurdy and Dillon’s commitment to craft shows. One current apprentice in the makeup department, who is just 14, was recently recruited to work on a movie that just wrapped filming at the mansion last month. Another makeup department alum went on to become a special effects artist who has worked on hit shows like “Stranger Things” and “Mandalorian.”
At Headless Horseman, the Jubies have also turned their production into an art form. Michael, a former private investigator, and Nancy, a nurse, have channeled their mutual love of Halloween into a sprawling 65-acre attraction that welcomes thousands of visitors each weekend from the end of September through Halloween weekend.
The Jubies now employ almost 300 people each autumn, most of whom are actors. They also have a dozen makeup artists and a seamstress who start working three hours in advance of the shows that run Friday through Sunday to transform actors into all sorts of creatures—from zombies to demonic clowns to the namesake headless horseman.
The couple have gone to great lengths in their pursuit of authenticity, including buying out the 1950s-era medical equipment and supplies from an abandoned hospital, and reconstructing a midcentury motel complete with vintage cars in the parking lot outside. On average, Jubie says it takes visitors two-and-a-half hours to go through the journey, which also changes its theme every year (this year’s is “Night of the Blood Moon”).
”When we first started, other people in the business used to ask me “Why do you do that? It’s just going to get dark,” says Jubie. “But if you’re detail-oriented, people notice.”
Manufacturing More than Just Screams
For these haunted attractions operators, October is just the tip of the spear. McCurdy and Dillon say that planning each year’s new story takes months. For nearly 30 years, they have attended the Halloween & Attractions Show in St. Louis in the spring to research new ideas for that year’s theme and network with peers. By the time the show opens at the end of September, McCurdy says the 10-person crew that works on the show year-round is pulling 12-hour days. “We’re practically living up here in the woods this time of year,” he says. “It’s like a small city.”
Behind the ghastly makeup and spooky sets is as much organization as imagination. “There’s a little bit more to the business than just scary,” says Jubie.
Headless Horseman offers visitors almost as much off the trail as it does on. The Jubies have transformed the former 18th-century horse exchange and its many historic buildings into a full festival of Halloween season delights. There’s a three-bedroom stone house that they rent out every weekend during the season, several concession stands, a food truck, a spooky confection shop, a gift shop, and a clothing store that carries tees, hoodies, and more produced by the Jubies’ company Sunshine Tees and Screenprinting. This year, they transformed their outdoor pavilion into the Horseman’s Tavern, which sells beer and wine.
Safety is always top of mind. Jubie says Headless Horseman has about 20 security guards and police officers on site, plus a team of three EMTs in a dedicated medical shed. With 65 acres to maintain, the year-round crew of 10 are also responsible for landscaping, watering the cornfield, and keeping its sizable parking lots clean. Behind the scenes, ticketing, concessions, and parking staff all report to the Jubies, who are there every night ensuring everything from admission scanners to the wagon lines flows smoothly.
Matching Passion with Profits
While the horror entertainment industry has been on an upward trajectory in recent years, McCurdy and Dillon say that the Haunted Mansion has always been a bit of a passion project. “Like anything in the entertainment business, we went through many, many dry spells,” says McCurdy. “10 or 15 years ago, we were putting flyers on doors in Wildwood, New Jersey, during a hurricane.”
Through their company, ImaginArt Studio, the two have been able to parlay their love of all things spooky into success in unexpected places. They’ve worked with clients to build 37 escape rooms across the country (as well as two of their own in the Hudson Valley) and they’re currently building out the interior of a new haunted tiki bar in San Antonio called Paradise Unknown. “Once we opened the escape rooms, it kind of stabilized things financially,” McCurdy says.
During the off-season at Headless Horseman, Jubie says they often do fundraisers for various local causes and recently produced a mass-casualty simulation attended by 15 local fire departments, 10 ambulance teams, and state police.
In addition to their haunted attractions, both operations also switch gears to produce holiday shows that start around Thanksgiving and run through the beginning of January—clearing out all the cobwebs and 15-foot skeletons and replacing them with a winter wonderland in just three weeks.
Despite all the hustle, the thrill of the fright is what keeps McCurdy and Dillon coming back to do it all over again every year.
“A lot of things in this industry, quite frankly, are just about the money,” says McCurdy. “For us, it’s not. It’s about being artistic, about sharing and creating different stories and different experiences for people on both sides, for us and for the guests.”
“It’s funny to say, but you hear people literally screaming and it actually makes you happy,” Dillon adds. “I’ll be out in the parking lot and hear someone, and it just makes me smile because that person just had a really good time.”
Kevin McCurdy’s Haunted Mansion is open Friday through Sunday through November 1, plus Indigenous Peoples Day/Columbus Day Monday. Headless Horseman Hayrides and Haunted Attractions is open Friday through Sunday through November 1.
