Paranormal expert Brocarde continues her California adventure, revealing the chilling past of America's first theme park, Knott's Berry Farm, and the ghostly tales woven into its Halloween celebrations.
During Halloween season in California, Brocarde attended the opening night of Knott's Scary Farm, a theme park with a reputation for paranormal folklore. Over the years, stories of real ghostly encounters have become part of the park's eerie identity.
From Berry Stall to Entertainment Empire
The story began in 1920 when Walter Knott and his wife, Cordelia, rented 20 acres in Buena Park, California, selling berries from a roadside stall. After rescuing six struggling berry plants from Rudolph Boysen's farm in Anaheim, Walter cultivated a large, tart fruit, naming it the boysenberry. It became a key ingredient in the farm's jams and famous boysenberry pie.
During the Great Depression in the 1930s, Cordelia began serving fried chicken dinners in a small tea room using her wedding china, with boysenberry pie for dessert. The modest roadside stop became a local sensation, with customers queuing around the block. To entertain the crowds, Walter added attractions in the 1940s, including buildings transported from Calico, a genuine ghost town in the California desert.
A Real Ghost Town's Legacy
In 1947, the attraction was officially declared Knott's Berry Farm, establishing America's first theme park. With parts of the park built around the bones of a real ghost town, stories circulated about historic buildings harbouring lingering spirits. The first Halloween haunt in 1973 embraced that rustic history, filling the ghost town with frontier characters, fog, and ghosts.
Today, reports of strange sightings and unexplained encounters are not limited to Halloween. Brocarde notes the park's rustic character remains intact, and understanding its history adds another level of appreciation.
Scare Mazes and Spectral Legends
Brocarde experienced Origins: The Curse of Calico, a long-running scare maze in its final year, telling the legend of Sarah Marshall, a woman from the mining town accused of witchcraft and sentenced to public hanging. The maze dramatises her curse, transforming inhabitants into undead creatures. She also tried Inked, a new maze set in a 1930s world of a washed-up cartoonist whose blood is magical ink bringing drawings to life.
Without big-budget franchises, Knott's Scary Farm relies on imagination, the same ingredient founder Walter Knott used when creating the park. One final ghost story suggests Walter Knott himself still haunts the park, with staff reportedly experiencing his presence, keeping watch over his creation from beyond the grave.
