Manufacturing Fun At The Haunt Factory (cont'd)

By Hal Raygun

'If I had to choose one defining moment that may have influenced my fate as a 'Halloween type person', I'd say it happened in First Grade.' reminisces Oliver, 'That Fall, my teacher Miss Nicholes had a Halloween party and everyone in my whole class came to school dressed in their costumes. That is to say, everyone but me, (I don't know why; maybe I was absent the day before, or perhaps I lost the take home note). Princesses and ghosts were running around laughing. Kitty cats and super heroes were playing.' This was Oliverís first real awareness of the fantastic concept of Halloween, and he felt sadly separated from it. According to Oliver, 'That hasn't happened since!'

At the tender age of nine, Oliverís mother planned a birthday shopping trip to the Morris Costumes retail store in Charlotte, North Carolina. 'Never before had I seen so many wonderful things all in one place.' Explains Oliver, 'I now liken this first visit to a twisted, Tim Burton version of Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, a wondrous place filled with creepy-nifty things!' Shortly after they had arrived, a gentleman with a bubbling personality, wearing a bright red sports jacket, took Oliver aside to show him around the store. 'We looked at the magic section and the make-up counter, and then he demonstrated for me a simple, inexpensive effect that I could do for myself,' remembers Oliver.

With the assistance of a small drop of 'secret liquid,' he proceeded to put a needle through the skin of Oliverís little wrist. 'He took great care and time in teaching me how I could do this safely, and to complete the simulated injury, he added a few drops of Zauder's stage blood, for added effect!' This newfound knowledge thrilled Oliver to no end, and as he ran over to show Mom, one can only imagine her realizing the serious error in judgment that she had made by introducing Oliver to Philip Morris. 'This visit to Morris Costumes, soon became a regular event,' states Oliver, 'and I would never be quite the same again.'

As children, the Holler siblings were as always doing goofy spooky things for fun. 'My younger brother and sister and I once took a battery operated coin bank, (you know, the one with the skeleton hand that reaches out of the box and grabs the penny,) and huddled together in a closet.' Describes Oliver, 'We taped the button down to make the hand operate continuously, and with a flashlight we projected an eerie clawing shadow on the wall, creating our first automated haunted house effect!'

One Halloween the Hollers ran a speaker from the car CB radio to the bushes. 'We would hunker down in the front seat of the blue Volkswagen Beetle and wait in the cold for trick or treaters to come to our house just so we could scream 'Boo' into the microphone.' Recalls Oliver adding, 'Of course we'd always save time for some intense treat gathering ourselves!' Another prank pulled on dear Mom, was Oliver running down the stairs to the kitchen screaming, 'It popped! It popped!' covering one eye with his hand. Fake blood streamed through his fingers and down his face. 'Seemed like an ingenious scare-prank to me, -prior to the spanking, of course,' jokes Oliver.

The Hollers started public Haunting in 1983 with a fundraiser for a local community theatre in Marion, North Carolina.  With Oliver at the helm, the MACA's Haunted Castle was a big success, so the event was repeated in 1984 with an Egyptian theme and called A Halloween Experience. Upon graduation from High School, Oliver explored different cities and jobs, and attended the University of North Carolina, later transferring to the University of Hawaii.  He returned to Marion in the summer of 1991 to work on the film Last of the Mohicans and fortunately, shooting wrapped just in time for the October season. "Using some of the money I had earned from the film, as well as some discarded props, we financed our own haunted house called The Scare Chamber," recounts Oliver.  "I had originally wanted to call it Horror ñBig Time, but fortunately, little brother overruled that decision!"

In 1993, Oliver and Chris, along with their family, and both of their girlfriends, Terry Droho and Brenda Brown (now Terry and Brenda Holler) temporarily took over a gothic-style building in the middle of Hendersonville, North Carolina. At one time the building had been a church, and to steer clear of any religious implications, it was decided that the theme of the attraction was to be a dark and dilapidated manufacturing plant, filled with ghosts and ghouls. "We were given use of the former church in exchange for cleaning it out,' recalls Oliver, 'which seemed like a pretty good deal -until we saw the interior!"

The building had been used as storage for years, and was jam-packed full of junk, old restaurant equipment, and boxes of papers. With this junk and equipment at their disposal, the theme of a factory began to really take shape. Adding to the challenge, the small team found themselves shoveling hundreds of pounds of dried pigeon dung out of the choir loft in order to use the balcony as an overhead vantage point to control special effects.

"It was a ridiculous amount of work just to get the building ready, much less the haunt,' grin Chris and Oliver, 'but we were blind with enthusiasm!" During the construction/clean up process, staple characters that inhabit the factory were created, including 'Raoul, the Insecurity Guard', and 'Elsie' the ever-popular ghost watch dog. While the maze structure, and construction techniques were primitive, the Hollers were already experimenting with air driven props on motion sensors to animate scares. One final touch was for guides wearing hardhats to give the tours of the attraction and The Haunt Factory was born.

The following years produced a rush of improvements in the wall construction and in the brothersí animation skills. The theme was articulated and solidified, as was a Haunt Factory Crew.  In the summer of 1994, one particular encounter proved key to fuller development of the attraction. Terry and Oliver had moved to Little River, South Carolina, a town just north of Myrtle Beach. Chris and Brenda were visiting and the foursome decided to hit the tourist strip. "We toured Mayhem Manor,' recalls Oliver, 'and just had a blast.' A summer seasonal Haunted Attraction, Mayhem Manor is themed around a single character, performed by one actor. At the end of the attraction, the Hollers stopped and were discussing what they had just seen, when the mad doctor himself, appeared and introduced himself as Leonard Pickel, the proprietor.

On that day an awareness of a previously unknown haunted industry was brought to the Holler brothers attention. 'Several techniques were shared, which helped [us] solve some maze layout problems we were having.' Explains Oliver, 'Leonard was also doing some work at an architectural firm at the time and his knowledge of building codes and safety made a big impression on me. We were able to apply some of his principals to what we were trying to achieve with our own theme."

Out of necessity, a trailer was purchased in October of 1994 to store the growing inventory of the Factoryís walls and props. This symbolized a commitment to continue operating The Haunt Factory for years to come. One early choice that the brothers made had to do with wheelchair accessibility. "Our grandmother, Mae Holler moved around in a wheelchair so it just seemed natural to make sure 'Amaw' could continue to visit the Factory after her stroke," recalls Oliver, "Her final year with us, we constructed our own spinning tunnel and although we had never seen one with a wide bridge and ramp, we designed it and built it." Today, the Factoryís devoted following of individuals in wheelchairs makes it out of the question to have it any other way.

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Reprinted with permission of Haunted Attraction Magazine