With Halloween right around the corner, haunted houses have begun to pop up everywhere. Here in Cranford, the most well-known haunted houses in town are the Livingston Avenue School Haunted House and the Cranford High School Happy Hauntings. However, since the infamous pandemic three years ago, Happy Hauntings has shut down with no plans to reopen. 

Happy Hauntings has been a fall tradition at Cranford High School since the times of Mr. Sorrentino. Happy Hauntings was a popular fundraiser that raised hundreds of dollars for the senior class’s prom. Every year, there was a different theme, such as 2012’s “The Raven,” by Edgar Allen Poe and 2008’s “Masquerade at Morbid Mansion,” allowing the high school to unite and work on a shared, enjoyable project. Designated for seniors only, the actors would dress up in scary costumes, practice their screams, and, if given, lines. The 10-15 minute tour included flashing lights and student actors trying to scare the “human” visitors. 

So now, the question is (especially for current CHS seniors): why has Happy Hauntings shut down? As seniors who missed out on this exciting event, we decided to find the answer to this extensive question. 

As our primary plan of action, we asked prominent staff at CHS, like the senior class advisers and teachers who have participated in the fundraiser in their years at Cranford. Each staff member interviewed mentioned a similar complaint: safety. Young children brought to the haunted house were terrified by the screaming teenage “monsters” that roamed the halls of CHS, a concern for parents who didn’t think much of a high school fundraiser. But aren’t haunted houses supposed to scare us? While this may be true, this terrifying factor was taken a step further. We decided to dig deeper, interviewing our vice principal Mr. Sorrentino. He mentioned how many beloved traditions, including Happy Hauntings, got “lost in the shuffle of Covid.”  There simply weren’t enough high school students in a post-quarantined world who volunteered for Happy Hauntings to continue. 

The end of Happy Hauntings may upset the Class of 2024, but not all hope is lost. The future graduating classes can rally together to bring this beloved tradition back. By advocating to the class advisor months in advance with the support of the whole class, there is hope for Happy Hauntings to haunt the halls of CHS once again. 

Sources: 

https://www.nj.com/cranford/2012/12/cranford_high_school_happy_hau.html 

https://www.nj.com/cranford/2008/10/cranford_high_school_students.html