Opinions stated in this article are solely those of the author. 

Utah leads the nation in adult spending for Halloween candy. Yes, we must love ghosts and goblins and things that go bump in the night.

At the same time, I hear many of my friends claim they have lately seen a decrease in the number of trick-or-treaters. Blame it on the trunk-or-treat events held by associations and churches…or maybe the increasing number of homeowners who turn off the porch light and attend an adult Halloween-themed party…or just that Utah’s child population is dwindling due to lower childbirth rates.

I don’t know, but one Davis County woman hasn’t seen fewer children trundling up to her door. Kris Hamblin of Kaysville is just one of numerous county households who create a spooky Halloween exhibition. It’s not large (only about 15-feet long), but for most of the children seeking candy at her front door where a ghoul awaits, they must enter Hamblin’s Swamp Tunnel.

Erected of pipe and wood and black plastic, the tunnel is an eerie walk, through laser lights and fog and seasonal witches and bats. The tunnel will attract some 150 visitors on Halloween night, many of them “veterans” of previous Hamblin props, others wide-eyed, hesitant preschoolers gripping their parents’ hands and anxious to see what evil prey will light up in the tunnel.

Kris didn’t grow up in a Halloween adventure. “My mother thought I was a freak when my husband Joe and I started putting up exhibits in our front yard,” she says. “We started small, and the ideas just grew with us.”

That was 32 years ago. Joe didn’t appreciate Halloween as much as his wife, but he enjoyed putting together the various haunted houses and Halloween settings in their backyard. “What’s the matter with you?” her mother would ask. Joe didn’t ask; he just went along with the fun and found room for a collection of Halloween regulars: werewolves, scarecrows, ghost spirits, fake blood, and a chainsaw.

Joe passed away earlier this year, but their son Jonathan and his wife Morgan will take his place in the Kris-envisioned Swamp Tunnel. Gone are the days when the Hamblins had volunteers hiding in the wings and springing out in the night to scare the youngsters, although, Kris says, young people today are more “numb” to scary events.

“They’ve seen scary movies on television, and what many have seen is pretty gruesome compared to what I saw when I was growing up, but Halloween still has its own charm.”

I look at my own neighborhood. There are a few giant spiders being placed on windows and one couple has placed a disfigured man with a monster mask sitting on a front porch swing. But most have gone a simple route: a few pumpkins, a lighted gourd, or a tombstone.

I can just imagine Kris looking at these homes in my neighborhood.

“Amateurs,” she’d probably say.  

Bryan Gray, a longtime Davis County resident, is a former school teacher and has been a columnist for more than 26 years in newspapers along the Wasatch Front.