BUCKHANNON, W.Va. (WV News) — Maniac Mountain is a different type of scary attraction for Halloween buffs with three separate attractions on the same site.
There’s a cornfield attraction called the Killing Field, a haunted junkyard called Death Metal and a haunted house called Hell House.
All three are thrilling to experience in and of themselves, but put together they offer hours of scares and frights in one evening.
Maniac Mountain is open every Friday and Saturday until the first weekend in November after Halloween.
Bobby Wagoner is originally from Buckhannon and oversees Maniac Mountain as one of the co-owners.
“We’ve been doing this five years. Each year we add more and more to the three attractions, and the crowds have been getting larger and larger, except for last year,” Wagoner said. “The reason is that it rained almost every single Friday and Saturday during October, but this year, the numbers are right back where they normally are. We usually average between 6,000 and 7,000 visitors each fall.”
Wagner said he approached two of his friends, Josh and Adam, about the idea of creating Maniac Mountain at least seven years before starting Maniac Mountain.
“I asked them if they had any property I could run to build the attractions like a haunted trail or haunted house. It didn’t work out back then, but they then bought the property here on Teter Road and it all worked out. Josh and Adam are good friends of mine; our dads were best friends, so we’ve known each other a long time,” Wagoner said.
“Our traditional haunted house is call Hell House, then we have the Killing Field and Junkyard attraction we call Death Metal. We have the only junkyard attraction anywhere we know of. Some Haunted House attractions will have a scene or two in a house or in a cornfield, but our junkyard is a separate attraction and sets aside on its own. We have gun towers, flipped upside down tractor trailers, a 1954 hearse, an old lab, an RV, a bunch of old cars and a school bus,” Wagoner said.
People from as far away as California have visited Maniac Mountain, and many other states like Michigan, Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Georgia, Wagoner said.
“We have a lot of the students from (West Virginia) Wesleyan College come each year, as well, and they live all over the country. We are on some really big industry listings for haunted attractions. The lady who came from California waited to visit friends in Buckhannon until we opened for the season. It’s pretty popular, and we’re getting better known around the state and the country,” Wagoner said.
He wants Maniac Mountain to be the number one rated haunted attraction in West Virginia, Wagoner said.
“We aren’t there yet, but we hope to be the best. It’s hard when kind of competing against the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum. We’re different from TALA in that we have built everything here for the attractions. We both scare people, but with different resources. Ours is mostly outside which makes, I think, spookier for people,” Wagoner said.
One of Wagoner’s favorite parts of being at and helping run Maniac Mountain is drawing up and then building the settings for the three attractions.
“I really like to create. I’ve always been artistic since I was a kid. I also really enjoy entertaining people, whether they laugh or scream. I can’t a single thing, because I like all of it. We have a Kid’s Day as well, which is kid-friendly. That means we have the lights on in the house, we cover up some of the gorish aspects of the attractions, and there are no actors involved. We want the kids to get scared, not traumatized,” said Wagoner followed quickly by a laugh.
He wants the children to have fun celebrating Halloween without getting scared too much, he added.
In addition to the Halloween season, Wagoner said they have done a Christmas-themed attraction. It takes a lot of work to switch out all of the Halloween items and replace them with Christmas-themed items like Christmas Trees and decorations, he said.
Anyone interested in attending Maniac Mountain can go to their Facebook page to sign up for a time slot on Friday or Saturday for the remaining season.
Maniac Mountain is located at 1659 Teter Road just outside Buckhannon.