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Photos: Key Club’s ‘Safe Halloween’ at Riverhead High School

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Of all the ghosts and ghouls roaming around Halloween night, the ones having the most fun may have been trick-or-treating through the haunted hallways of Riverhead High School.

The Riverhead High School Key Club transformed the building into the school’s spooktacular “Safe Halloween” event, where hundreds of parents and young children played games, made arts and crafts, got candy from classrooms and tested their bravery in a scary hallway of terror.

Children had the chance to pick pumpkins, weave through a stringy web for candy and play ring toss and bowling games for prizes in the school cafeteria.

While students decorated, Key Club advisor and high school teacher Lawrence Mandresh asked them to stop at one point and look around at what they had accomplished.

“You guys — you made a memory,” he said.

In an interview, Mr. Mandresh said he was proud of his students who came up with the idea.

“They did it phenomenally,” he added. “The Riverhead community deserves this. Hopefully, this is the first of many to come.”

Safe Halloween was created over the summer, said Key Club treasurer Shannon Zeltman, who helped coordinate Monday’s event while dressed in a witch’s costume.

It was the Key Club’s biggest success so far, added Key Club president Sarah Brennan, who noted the group — an offshoot of the Kiwanis civic organization — included a fresh group of volunteers.

“I couldn’t sleep last night,” she said. “We came in at 2 p.m. and pulled it all together.

“I’m super excited,” she added while smiling at the trick-or-treaters.

Other school clubs, like the district’s Interact Club and NJROTC, also volunteered at Safe Halloween.

“It’s awesome to have the other clubs’ help,” said Catherine Farell, the Key Club’s secretary.

In addition to the Key Club’s efforts, the school’s special education class held a bake sale, the photography club organized a photo op with a hay bale, and the school’s jazz band played Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.”

Shaunice Faines, the mother of a Phillips Avenue Elementary School student who was trick-or-treating at the event, described Safe Halloween as a “great idea.”

“It’s safer than going trick-or-treating with strangers,” she said.

Joy Flynn, a volunteer with the North Fork Spanish Apostolate, took five young children around the halls of the school for candy and prizes called the event “fabulous.”

“It couldn’t be better,” she said.

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Top photo: Shelby, 11, and her brother, Liam, 7, crawl under a web to find candy at Riverhead High School Key Club’s Safe Halloween event Monday night. (Credit: Paul Squire)

Riverhead Key Club Safe Halloween
Five-year-old Jermaine Daniels as Spiderman decorating a pumpkin.

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Trinity Strand, 7, tosses a ring at the witch's hat in the Riverhead High School spookified cafeteria at Safe Halloween.
Trinity Strand, 7, tosses a ring at the witch’s hat.

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Riverhead High School sophomores Ciara Tobin and Noah Brandi hand out candy to trick-or-treaters at the Key Club's Safe Halloween event.
Riverhead High School sophomores Ciara Tobin and Noah Brandi hand out candy to trick-or-treaters.

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Members of the Riverhead High School Jazz Band perform Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' at Riverhead High School Key Club's Safe Halloween event.
Members of the Riverhead High School Jazz Band perform Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller.’
Nine-year-old Luis Aguilar from Aquebogue bowls down candy corn pins at Riverhead High School Key Club's Safe Halloween event.
Nine-year-old Luis Aguilar from Aquebogue bowls down candy corn pins.
Riverhead High School Key Club's Safe Halloween event included arts and crafts like pumpkin decorating in the school's cafeteria.
Arts and crafts included pumpkin decorating in the school’s cafeteria.
Seven-year-old Phillips Avenue student Zareah Rivero dressed up as a grandma for Riverhead High School Key Club's Safe Halloween event.
Seven-year-old Zareah Rivero dressed up as a grandma.
The Safe Halloween event featured activites set up by several Riverhead High School clubs, including the Photo Club's photo shoot on hay bales.
The photography club’s photo shoot.
Riverhead High School junior and Key Club president Sarah Brennan watches as 'Harry Potter' knocks over pins in one of the Safe Halloween events.
Riverhead High School junior and Key Club president Sarah Brennan watches as ‘Harry Potter’ knocks over bowling pins.

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