Area woman's home pays homage to Halloween

COLDWATER - Margaret Klosterman isn't afraid of much.

When a big, black spider recently scurried across her living room floor, the 74-year-old repeatedly clobbered it until it was still. Soon, she realized it was just a plastic toy - a tiny part of the huge Halloween spectacle she annually creates in her Coldwater home.

"Sometimes things go off in the middle of the night," she said, referring to the dozens of battery-operated decorations that emit witches' screams, mummy moans and other eerie noises. "If a car goes by, the headlights can sometimes set them off."

Nearly every room in her house is filled from floor to ceiling with faux bats, body parts and spine-chilling ghosts, skeletons, goblins and monsters. Anxiety-filled visitors are greeted in the bathroom by romping rats.

The windows of her home are covered with dark, decorative sheets to enhance the ghostly experience. Even her attached garage is transformed into a frightening trail.

"The garage is the last room I do because I can't park the car in there until Halloween is over," Klosterman said. "I just hope we don't get frost. I'd have to scrape the windshield."

She became a serious decorator about nine years ago, shortly after her husband, Mark, passed away. He also enjoyed the decorations, she said.

"I think he would like this," she said looking around. "I wanted the shock and awe factor."

She starts hanging and displaying items in early September, working several hours each day. When she tires, she breaks for her favorite pastime: reading.

Klosterman formerly worked for 20 years as a hairstylist in Chickasaw and Osgood. She also was employed for several years at the local Walmart, said the mother of four and grandmother of nine.

"That's where I first saw some of this stuff," she said, flinging the spider webs that drape her furniture and walls.

Some of the Halloween decorations are gifts from friends, others were purchased at garage and estate sales or stores. Klosterman, who also quilts, handmade many of the pieces.

One of her crafty ideas was attaching bubble wrap to the underside of floor rugs. In the dimly lit garage, the popping noise is startling to the hundred or so relatives and friends who visit each year.

"From bats flying on the ceiling fan, cackling witches circling her table with bowls of floating eyeballs, skeletons with flashing faces, to the crawling hand making its way across the countertop, every inch of the living room, dining room, kitchen and garage are full of Halloween items," said Michelle Luthman, a local 4-H adviser who annually brings club members to the house.

One of Klosterman's favorite items is a realistic, 5-foot-tall figure in a corner of the garage.

"The old grandma witch is about 15 years old," she said. "I don't remember where I got the face but I put her together. The dress is one of my daughter's old costumes."

No single piece of the massive collection appears to be a favorite of visitors, she said.

"Most of the time people just can't believe all of it," Klosterman said. "I think the adults often like it better. Kids just run from thing to thing."

Women often ask her where she stores the decorations in the off-season, she said.

"I have a basement and a lot of things collapse," she said, glancing at the 10-foot-tall, inflatable Grim Reaper a few feet away.

It takes Klosterman about 15 minutes to turn on the dozens of animated figures in each room. She welcomes batteries as gifts, she said with a laugh.

"It takes a lot of them," she added.

A family friend, Elaine Dicke, was taken aback when she first walked into Klosterman's spooky dwelling.

"I was told she had decorated her house for Halloween but I had not expected my eyes to go wide with shock," she said. "You have to pay close attention because there are so many details. It is easy to miss everything."

Dicke said each year she scans the rooms for new additions. The visit brings back memories of her childhood, she said.

"It scares and thrills you but at the same time takes you back to your youth," Dicke said.

Klosterman's college-age grandson, Jordan Klosterman, said Halloween is his favorite time of year, thanks to his grandmother.
   "For as long as I can remember my grandmother has always been in the Halloween spirit. I remember growing up, when she still lived in Chickasaw, she would decorate her house and always have a haunted house for her grandkids to go through," he recalled.

When his grandmother moved to Coldwater, the decorations and his excitement greatly increased, he said. His friends have tagged along the last five years, he added.

"When they walk in for the first time, their facial expressions are priceless. They always enjoy going back each year," Jordan Klosterman said.

He hopes that one day he can continue the tradition.

"Her love for Halloween and the unusual things made Halloween my favorite holiday. I am so happy that she does this each year ... it makes me proud to be her grandson," he said.

Margaret Klosterman explained very simply why the spooky season is so special to her.

"I just love to create things," she said. "It's a way to express myself. But I don't like bloody stuff and people jumping out at you."

Each year after Halloween is over she scans store shelves for reduced items to use for next year's display, if there is one.

"Every year I say this will be my last year," she said, shaking her head with a laugh. "But it probably won't be."