Giant 12-foot skeletons often linger on lawns past Halloween

It’s the season once again, just before Halloween, when the skeletons come out of the closet.

But in the last few years, some of those skeletons have gotten so large, that even after the holiday is over, they aren't going back in the closet — or basement or attic — for months, if at all.

For now, though, folks have set up their oversize skeletons, which some news media have dubbed Skelly, in a variety of poses on their front lawns. They are, along with the cooler air and falling leaves, helping to set the Halloween ambience. Although many of the displays are more adorable than horrible.

In Pleasant Ridge, just off Woodward, and not far from a funeral home, a family set up a 12-foot Skelly, reaching out as if to catch two smaller, curious skeletons, that look like they are climbing up — or falling off — a porch post to fetch pumpkins on the roof.

In downtown St. Clair Shores, a block of shops, restaurants — and even a car dealer — have set up themed displays with perhaps as many as a three dozen skeletons, including a few larger-than-life ones. An entire event, from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, has been planned to celebrate skeletons.

"As part of Skelebration, we have encouraged all of our members to use skeletons as a theme," said Gloria Kinne, a member of the Nine-Mack Merchants Association board, which is sponsoring the event. "The giant ones are just harder to get up and to store afterwards."

Kinne, who has a gift store, said she has a skeleton display of shoppers. The hardware store has one of the skeletons raking up leaves — and one even falling into a toilet. The real estate company's skeleton is hammering a "for sale" sign in the ground. And the dance studio has them dressed in tutus.

In its third year, Skelebration invites kids in costume, and their parents, to trick-or-treat, and pass out candy. It also precedes the community's last social district event of the year. They are essentially street parties, when bars — from 5 p.m. to midnight — are allowed to sell spirits, alcoholic drinks, that can be consumed outdoors.

'Bigger is definitely better'

A large skeleton, down the road from Pierce Elementary School in Birmingham, has prompted competitive next-door neighbors — the Berres — to decorate with an even larger, 20-foot inflatable Frankenstein.

"Bigger is definitely better," A.J. Berres, 40, said Tuesday. "We’re really close with our neighbors and they do a great display and every year they up the ante, so it has turned into a friendly competition to keep adding to the yard. We’re all about Halloween."

Berres and his 39-year-old wife, Amanda, have a daughter, 7, and son, 4. They’re planning to wear two sets of Barbie and Ken costumes.

"That first day, once you get the decorations up, the kids just light up," he said, emphasizing "light up" with a snap. His face lit up, too, as he said it. "They start talking about trick-or-treating, what they are going to be. It sets the mood for the rest of the season."

More: Spooky season: Here's the most popular Halloween candy in Michigan

In addition to the towering, two-story green monster, the Berres have staged an Aragog-size spider, ghosts that seem to be flying out of the windows, and a graveyard with headstones. Inside their home, pointy black witches dangle from the ceiling.

They have to do all that, Berres said, just to keep up with the giant skeleton next door.

A whimsical indulgence

Oversize skeletons began taking over suburban lawns nationwide in 2020. Back then, the pandemic — one of the scariest things Americans had faced in a while — had taken the lives of millions and weighed on many people’s minds.

As a result, when it came to Halloween, some had just stopped going door-to-door trick-or-treating and passing out candy. In addition, with everyone wearing masks all the time, it no longer seemed fun to put one on. And with so many real deaths, some were turned off talking about imaginary ones.

But other folks, who wouldn’t let go of their Halloween traditions, found that instead of going door to door, they could still admire displays from their cars.

As a result, despite the pandemic, stores started selling out of the gigantic skeletons, prompting the Washington Post to ask: "Can gigantic skeletons save Halloween?"

The Post concluded that "in a truly frightening season on a truly haunted year" those big skeletons, which were selling at Home Depot and other places for upward of $300, were "a reminder that whimsical indulgences are still permitted, no matter how morbid American life has become."

The Post also noted that the skeletons had become a "coveted decoration" as well as "an Internet meme, a status marker, a coping mechanism, and memento mori," a Latin phrase for, "We’re all eventually going to die."

Or a public nuisance

Just a year later, in 2021, the same newspaper and same writer, wrote another feature about the big-boned decorations. By then, some people started to feel like the skeletons were becoming neighborhood nuisances.

Under the online headline, "Huge skeletons are just part of how we live now," the Post reported that Jake Levin, of Oakland, Florida, got word from his homeowners association he needed to put his enormous skeleton, well, back in the closet — or be fined.

Instead of taking down the skeleton, whom Levin named Indiana Bones, he tried to circumvent the rules by putting seasonal outfits on him, as grandma does with her stone goose, dressing it in apparel appropriate for each holiday. Bones got a turkey leg for Thanksgiving, a Santa suit for Christmas, and a leprechaun costume for St. Paddy’s.

Levin, of course, isn't the only one doing this.

Others in Florida had similar ideas, and multiple news outlets have reported that instead of packing Skelly away, residents in various states — including Ohio, Alaska, and Oklahoma — have been leaving Skelly out for more than just Halloween.

Closer to home, A.J. Berres said that his neighbor doesn’t leave his skeleton up all year, it does linger in the yard past Halloween because it’s so big and "so hard to take down" and it ends up getting dressed "like Santa Claus for Christmas."

'Impactful, yet simplistic'

The skeletons are garnering tremendous social and mainstream media attention this year, too. There are photos and videos of them everywhere, including a clever one on TikTok depicting what they do "when you leave the house."

And this year, when the Post published a report on Skelly — big skeleton stories now seem to be an annual tradition at that newspaper — it called him the "king of Halloween." He is still so popular, the Post wrote, Home Depot just "can’t find an act to follow him."

Jessica Herzig, who put up the big skeleton display in Pleasant Ridge, said this is the second year she has done it. She said she bought the skeleton last year online — and probably paid too much for it — because it was sold out in stores, but she loves Halloween, perhaps even more than Christmas.

She also said she is originally from Texas and "likes anything big."

"I’m not into the whole, gory, overly cluttered look," Herzig, 42, said. "For me, I love the giant skeleton because it is impactful, yet simplistic. I can do something fun with it and pose it different ways. This year, I added the two smaller skeletons that look like they’re up to mischief, falling off the roof."

She said her three kids — Chloe, 11; Hudson, 8, and Peyton, 4 — helped her figure out the poses.

Jessica Herzig acknowledged that in that scene she’s probably the big skeleton. And one of those smaller skeletons, Chloe chimed in, is Hudson — for sure. Herzig's 44-year-old husband, Todd, said he has little to do with the displays: "This is my wife’s project."

His efforts, he added, are limited to helping put it up and take it down.

They got several compliments about the display being set up, and then a few more on one of the community Facebook pages. A neighbor gave them a shout-out, but also a hard time, because they put it up so early, in September.

Jessica Herzig promises to take the display down right after Halloween but already has ideas for next year.

Contact Frank Witsil: 313-222-5022 or fwitsil@freepress.com.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Giant 12-foot Halloween skeleton decorations called Skelly are popular