Groans, shuffling feet and dance moves by Michael Jackson impersonators echoed through the Oak Leyden Developmental Center on Friday, but there was no cause for alarm. The lifelong learning center on Chicago Avenue transformed its programming for a much anticipated “Zombie Apocalypse” haunted house, open to a limited group of community friends and volunteers.
Building the haunted rooms began at the beginning of October when program director Chaunteese Lewis, announced this year’s zombie apocalypse theme, and the creative juices started to flow as participants and staff got ready for the third annual haunted house.
Oak Leyden, which has served people with developmental disabilities since 1956, provides a variety of programs. This program works with adults who are disabled to build self-sufficiency skills and community engagement. About a dozen brave visitors were able to walk through four rooms with the lights down low. Being invited to the Halloween wasteland was the reward for several local volunteers who support Oak Leyden throughout the year. This included members of the Oak Park Women’s Guild, Will Duncan and Jess King from Fitzgeralds and adopt a CILA friends Michelle Todd and Jeff Bach, as well as administrative staff from Oak Leyden.
This year the participants took creative control of four classrooms transforming them into an immersive haunted house. The individuals enrolled in the center day program have worked to build props, paint displays, create scare zones and create themed experiences.
“Clients work together as a team to make decorations,” Lewis explained. “I give them one big theme — Zombie Apocalypse, and together people take the month to build it as modifications are made to individual abilities and strengths.”
Every detail of a haunted experience was considered, from the pallets painted black to the multicolored faux hands climbing out of the ground. Some of the meticulously planned “blood” splatters and caution signs on the doorways were conceptualized and crafted over the month, while others were laid out just before visitors came through.
One room included a Disney twist with a solo acapella of “It’s a Small World,” while another played creepy music over speakers and featured a zombie surgery in a morgue. Another room had prepared a skeleton themed display with bones chained to the ground and was a favorite Halloween decoration. Visitors walking through were blasted with scary music and costumed participants were ready to growl and claw to impress the guests.
It was the full zombie invasion of room three that featured the lifecycle of a zombie, including the moment of birth — shown with painted gloves on cardboard tubes reaching out from the cemetery and a few zombie heads popping their way out of the soil.
Across the room was an ofrenda, a sacred display of the friends and family participants have loved and lost over the years. The colorful alter was inspired by a participant who shared her grief after her mother passed away. Lily Yarger, a direct service professional, was looking for ways to help her find ways to honor her mother.
“On Monday we will celebrate with decorations, salt water and sugar skulls,” Yager said. “And then we will remember our loved ones in a happy way.”
The event served a dual purpose: providing an immersive, sensory-rich project for the participants to build teamwork and confidence, and opening the center’s doors to the community in a fun, interactive way. Visitors praised the work and immense effort put into the haunted layout.
With the zombie apocalypse successfully contained, center organizers and participants are getting ready for the holidays. This will include a special Oak Leyden Choir performance at one of Fitzgerald’s Vince Guaraldi’s Charlie Brown Christmas shows this winter.