Enter if you dare
It's the scary soiree of the season.
Everyone who's anyone in the annals of lurid literature will be there. The guest list reads like a who's who of the who-done-it: Jack the Ripper, Lizzie Borden, Dracula, Frankenstein, mummies, pirates, murderers and magicians.
All of the aforementioned, in spirit and maybe in physical form, will be on hand for this year's All Hallows Eve event at Naper Settlement, a two-night scareathon this Friday and Saturday.
"This year's theme is 'Village of Fear,' " said Maureen Malloy, education events coordinator for the 19th century museum village.
The village's Victorian-era buildings and grounds, lit only by kerosene lamps on shepherd's crooks, will set the scene for the resurrection of horrors that haunted the townsfolk in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Malloy said.
"We've got 13 acres of haunt," she said.
Visitors can journey through the underworld, see an Egyptian mummy's tomb and watch a Civil War-era surgeon use 1860s medical technology to operate on wounded soldiers.
The story of Lizzie Borden, who was tried for the brutal 1892 hatchet murders of her parents in Fall River, Mass., will be recalled inside the settlement's Halfway House.
The Martin Mitchell Mansion, Malloy said, will be haunted on those two nights and visitors will be dared to tour the house and haunted graveyard just beyond.
All Hallows Eve visitors may also witness an attempt to commune with the dead.
Seances were popular in the 19th century, Malloy said. The Davenport brothers of New York toured the country and staged seances in many cities, she said.
The brothers would ask volunteers to enter a contraption they called a "spirit chamber." When they did, events would occur that suggested the presence of those who had passed on.
"We're going to re-create all of that in a big-top tent," she said.
Emmett Miller, a Chicago-area magician, will preside in the role of one of the Davenport brothers. He's attempted to replicate the Davenports' seances before, with mixed results, he said.
"This is the first time we've gotten everything together," he said, including the exact dimensions of the original spirit chamber.
Heather Davenport, a descendant of the Davenport brothers, has agreed to come from Florida so she can be placed inside the box, he said.
Miller said the energy created may cause objects to move or music to be heard.
A theory that Miller gives credence to suggest that ghosts are not simply spirits trapped between the worlds of the living and the dead, but emotional echoes.
"Ghosts tend to be a remnant of a highly-charged emotional event," he said.
On both nights, the settlement grounds also will host a bonfire, face-painters, fire dancers and a gypsy village full of fortune-tellers, Malloy said.
Seemingly headless horsemen will charge by on steeds, and a house will take on the persona of a human and come alive. The grim reaper is expected to attend and mingle.
Inside Century Memorial Chapel, visitors will find a "thought-reader" and an expert on haunted history.
Last year, Malloy said, about 2,800 people attended. Most were teens and adults, she said.
"We don't really recommend it for little kids," she said. "If you're 3 or 4 years old, it might be quite scary."
If you go
What: All Hallows Eve
Where: Naper Settlement, 523 S. Webster St., Naperville
When: 6:30 to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday
Cost: $9
Info: (630) 420-6010 or napersettlement.museum