--- title: Halloween Haunted Houses: How They Evolved Over the Years description: A century of scares, from Edwardian fairs to Six Flags canonical: https://time.com/4092535/haunted-houses-evolution/ author: Arpita Aneja article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-10-29T22:26:56.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T12:11:21.907Z article:section: History og:title: See How Haunted Houses Have Evolved Over the Years og:description: A century of scares, from Edwardian fairs to Six Flags og:url: https://time.com/4092535/haunted-houses-evolution/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt560ad69a68def787/69886ed65f570fe4aab1e1a7/gettyimages-569163483.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1388 og:image:height: 781 og:image:alt: FrightFair actor Jennifer Ubillus (CQ), 22, left, sprays hair coloring on coworker Sarah Utso (CQ), og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: See How Haunted Houses Have Evolved Over the Years twitter:description: A century of scares, from Edwardian fairs to Six Flags twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt560ad69a68def787/69886ed65f570fe4aab1e1a7/gettyimages-569163483.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # See How Haunted Houses Have Evolved Over the Years > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription.  by [Arpita Aneja](https://time.com/author/arpita-aneja/)  ## Arpita Aneja Oct 29, 2015 10:26 PM UTC  FrightFair actor Jennifer Ubillus (CQ), 22, left, sprays hair coloring on co–worker Sarah Utso (CQ), 19, right, prior to taking their positions inside the Chatsworth haunted house on October 19, 2000\. DIGITAL IMAGE. (Photo by Brian Vander Brug/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images) FrightFair actor Jennifer Ubillus (CQ), 22, left, sprays hair coloring on co–worker Sarah Utso (CQ), 19, right, prior to taking their positions inside the Chatsworth haunted house on October 19, 2000\. DIGITAL IMAGE. (Photo by Brian Vander Brug/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images) Brian Vander Brug—LA Times via Getty Images  by [Arpita Aneja](https://time.com/author/arpita-aneja/)  ## Arpita Aneja Oct 29, 2015 10:26 PM UTC These days, it only seems natural that you’d pay real money to enter a dilapidated building that exists solely to scare you—but that wasn’t always the case. Though Halloween has always been associated with the things that go bump in the night, the commercialized haunted house attracted is a relatively recent invention. Here’s how it came to be. **_Read more about the haunted house business, here in the TIME Vault:_** [Monsters Inc.: Inside the Weird World of Professional Haunting](http://time.com/vault/issue/2013-10-28/page/52/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4092535/haunted-houses-evolution/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4092535/haunted-houses-evolution/"},"headline":"See How Haunted Houses Have Evolved Over the Years","datePublished":"2015-10-29T22:26:56.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T12:11:21.907Z","description":"A century of scares, from Edwardian fairs to Six Flags","url":"https://time.com/4092535/haunted-houses-evolution/","keywords":["Business topic","Holidays"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt560ad69a68def787/69886ed65f570fe4aab1e1a7/gettyimages-569163483.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Arpita Aneja","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/arpita-aneja/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt560ad69a68def787/69886ed65f570fe4aab1e1a7/gettyimages-569163483.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"FrightFair actor Jennifer Ubillus (CQ), 22, left, sprays hair coloring on coworker Sarah Utso (CQ),","caption":"FrightFair actor Jennifer Ubillus (CQ), 22, left, sprays hair coloring on coworker Sarah Utso (CQ),","creditText":"Brian Vander Brug—LA Times via Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4092535/haunted-houses-evolution/","name":"See How Haunted Houses Have Evolved Over the Years"}}]}] ```