A frightening display in Baldwin

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As I was driving down Kings Parkway last week looking for Pat Gilardi’s house number I wasn’t sure if I had passed his home and its extravagant Halloween display. About 10 seconds later, I realized there was no need to look at house numbers in the first place.

I pulled in front of a brown home with dozens of spooky and elaborate dummies perched on the property and knew this was my stop.

Gilardi, who grew up in Baldwin, attended Brookside Elementary School and graduated Baldwin High School in 1975, returned to his hometown three years ago after raising a family in Rockville Centre.

Last year, Gilardi and his daughters (he has four) set up their Halloween display for the first time in Baldwin after doing something similar in Rockville Centre years earlier.

Two of his college-age daughters came home earlier this month to help Gilardi turn his home into the most frightening one on the block. There are now dozens of life-sized dummies in front and on top of Gilardi’s home, each one more unique than the last.

Gilardi makes each dummy himself and uses his garage as a workstation. After building the body, which takes about an hour, he purchases a mask and hands. Then he finds local garage sales to purchase clothes for the new dummy, and lastly he picks out a spot for it to stand.

In recent years, Gilardi said he’s noticed more and more people not putting up Halloween decorations. “So I figured let me go over the top with it,” he said.

And although he’s the one who builds the dummies, he still gets startled every once in a while. Like when he put the first one up in his front yard, walked out of his house the next morning and saw a six-foot figure leaning against his house. Also, when he’s building a new dummy in his garage it can still make him jump. “No matter how many times you walk in there it startles you,” he said.

On nice October nights, Gilardi said families from the neighborhood stop by to look at his display and added that’s he’s received a lot of compliments. For Halloween night, Gilardi’s favorite holiday, he plans on having a smoke machine cranking and spotlights on to enhance the experience.