The Collegian sent a representative to all three haunted houses on Hillsdale’s campus. Unfortunately that representative was me — a woman whose fight or flight response is freeze, and who genuinely has trouble distinguishing between fact and fiction. It’s best not to read this as an expert testimonial, but rather, a set of personal experiences from the very last person who should have undertaken this task.
Simpson Asylum
The Asylum’s organizers sent 10 of us through together, and I strategically picked my spot in the dead middle, so as to avoid being touched by the Simpson men. This was an incredibly unsuccessful strategy. One word of advice to the men of Simpson: there was really no reason for me to be touched as many times as I was in the 15 or so minutes it took to traverse the halls of the dormitory. A tad more psychological terror and fewer ominous, little hands would have made the experience more enjoyable.
They kept the showers running the entire time — the Simpson utilities bill is going to be crazy this month — so the bathrooms were all filled with thick air. They used squirt guns filled with water (I hope) to catch everybody off guard here and there. There was even a dead body who smiled up at us when we mused about who it could be. These details were not particularly scary, but provided an additional layer to an already intense sensory experience.
Head Simpson Resident Assistant Junior Nathan Rastovac said many of the men put in eight hours of prep work the day of, two hours of accepting haunted house goers, and three hours of total run time. Then, they did about an hour and a half of take down, garbage, and clean up.
Simpson Asylum wins in terms of participation and enthusiasm. From the tour guides who encountered every jump scare like they had never seen it before, to the guy who didn’t blink a single time as his head protruded through a curtain, to the freaks who somehow grabbed my upper thigh, the haunted house worked because no one acted like they were too cool or too busy to give it their all for a good cause — raising money for the Salvation Army’s Holiday Giving program.
“It’s the culture,” Rastovac said. “Every year, the upperclassmen, in particular, whether they’re RAs or just like the seniors or juniors or sophomores that are there, they are all leaders. And one of the things we say is like, ‘Look, you are all a leader of your own life. You’re going to be leaders of families one day. So like, take some ownership. And let’s have some fun while we do it.’”
Physics Department
The physics department hosted a haunted lab in the depths of Strosacker. The Society of Physics Students cultivated an equally fun and tense vibe, but I felt safe the whole time. There were formulas and equations that I am assuming were only really scary to physics students, but there were a few jump scares that were startling to a broader audience.
At some point, a man in a mask jumped out, and my fight or flight kicked in. I backed up and started to wander in a direction other than where I was supposed to be going. I ran into a bowl or a container of water (I hope) that spilled down my leg and onto the floor. My friend Bella Dix, following close behind me, slipped and fell on all fours onto the ground. I charged ahead, unaware, and the physics students continued to scare and surround my helpless friend. She eventually escaped, and we emerged in freedom as I yelled “Why am I wet? Seriously, guys, what liquid is this??” and she yelled “I fell, I fell, I literally fell!”
“I was humiliated,” Dix said. “Despite my fall and my useless screaming for the group that left, the actors did not break character, and one continued to reach their hands toward me, moaning ‘Help me,’ even though I was the one that needed help. I woke up the next morning with bruises. But at the end of the day, it was hilarious, and I eventually reunited with my friends.”
As a whole, this was a quick haunted tour that was the friendliest out of all of them to easily frightened people. I screamed a lot, probably the most out of any of their participants, but I never felt overwhelmed.
This one was my favorite because it was kind of scary, but mostly just bizarre. And I was not touched a single time.
Delta Sigma Phi
Again, I positioned myself in the middle of the line going through the house, so as to absorb any jumpscares secondhand. This house was scarier than physics, and less overstimulating than Simpson. It was very clearly football boys in masks, and they weren’t necessarily trying to obscure that.
“I think the basement is what sets our house apart, because the DSP basement is scary enough as is without putting anybody down there to scare you,” DSP President Matt Andoni said. “Once you have people down there to scare you, it’s even more scary. I think that’s what everybody finds to be the scariest part.”
This is a true sentiment. The basement and the spiral staircase going down to it were the scariest part, with what appeared to be a religious ceremony of some sort and a guy who chased us down there with a chainsaw. When they sent us running the other direction at the end, we were all so scared it seemed that we maybe ran too far in the other direction. The DSPs, in their monster/football voices, redirected us with a chorus of “This way! This way!”
“I think it kind of doubles as being something that’s scary too, because I know people come to haunted houses to get scared,” Andoni said. “But I think our main goal is to entertain. Scaring kind of just comes as an additional bonus.”