Ghoul Morning: A Lingering Legacy at the Haunted Farm in Moorhead

MOORHEAD, Minn. — When Dale Nygaard’s dad started the Haunted Farm back in 1995, none of the Nygaard family was what you’d call a pro at this haunting business.

Melcolm Nygaard was by no means a showbiz guy; instead, he’d run a hardware store out west.

But that wasn’t stopping him, says Dale, who shortly thereafter moved back from Washington state and decided, with his wife Paula, to pitch in.

“When he started, I wondered what the heck is he doing here. Then, it took off,” said Dale.

Ardis Nygaard is Dale’s mother, and says her husband saw right away when they bought that first farm building in rural Moorhead that there wasn’t much for the littlest kids to do there around Halloween.

So Mel hitched up his horses and hay wagon, and with the help of their daughter, put the neighborhood kids on a haunted hay wagon ride up and down the road, complete with skits and scares, she says.

Much to their surprise, Dale, Paula, and their then-small children got sucked into the scare business too, working each year to help create more and more elaborate scares for the farm layout.

Dale and Paula welcomed their new baby granddaughter just about a year ago, right around what would have been Mel’s September 26th birthday.

And she’s not the only kid out here with Haunted Farm roots.

Alex Lass has been best friends with the Nygaard’s son since kindergarten and started working as a cast member as a young teen, the same age as a lot of the young cast members today.

He and his partner, and longtime fellow cast member Carley Laporte, recently welcomed their own original Haunted Farm creation —  their baby son,  Brooks.

It’s a fitting legacy for the farm Mel built, they say, since he loved children and established the farm for the neighborhood kids.

All these years later, his widow Ardis is still playing the witch, “with a cackle like you wouldn’t believe,” says Paula.

And Mel is around, in more ways than one, Dale says.

Just before Mel died in July 2024, he expressed a desire for them to build a new haunt on the farm, featuring a small rural town with a hardware store front.

“Mel’s Mercantile,” says Dale, with a sigh. “It’s got a mannequin dressed as him out front.”

“Sitting on the porch in a rocking chair,” adds Paula.

A little like having a piece of him still around?

“Actually, a piece of him is here,” says Dale. “He was cremated.” He laughs.

“I don’t tell anybody where he’s at…. but he’s here.”

The Haunted Farm runs this year through Halloween, Friday, October 31st.

For more information:

https://www.hauntedfarm.com/