At 11 a.m. on Saturday, October 31, more than 30 business partners start handing out candy around Fountain Park at 300 East Main Street, and the costume contests for kids ages 2 to 14 get underway with cash and prizes. At 1 p.m. the crowd moves to Main Street. At 7:30 p.m. the lights go down inside a 750-seat auditorium on Crawford Road. This year Halloween falls on a Saturday, so the city's three main Halloween events run in sequence on one day, each one sending people to the next.
The oldest of the three was created for a different purpose than the one it serves now, and that history explains how the whole day is laid out.
The 1983 Fix That Became the Opening Act
The City of Rock Hill's calendar entry for this year's event spells out where it came from:
"BooHaHa started in 1983 as a safe alternative to neighborhood Trick or Treating in Rock Hill and has grown since."
This is the 43rd annual BooHaHa, hosted by OTS Media and the Old Town Association. It started as a substitute for going door to door. Today the calendar treats it as the first stop: the same entry tells families to "head to Main Street for the Halloween Spooktacular (until 7 PM)" once BooHaHa wraps at 1 p.m. The Spooktacular page then sends people home, describing the street festival as a way "to keep the Halloween festivities going before you head out trick-or-treating."
So an event built to replace neighborhood trick-or-treating is now scheduled to lead into it. One practical rule from the city: BooHaHa asks that pets stay home.
How the Hours Fit Together
The handoffs are tight because the published times line up almost exactly. From Visit Rock Hill's fall events page and the city calendar, here is the Saturday in order:
- 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., BooHaHa at Fountain Park. Trick-or-treating with more than 30 business partners, plus costume contests for ages 2 to 14.
- 1 p.m. to 7 p.m., Halloween Spooktacular on Main Street. Inflatables, rides, live music and train rides, all free, though the page notes activities may change.
- Neighborhood trick-or-treating, which the Spooktacular page assumes comes next for many families.
- 7:30 p.m., Fright Night at McGirt Auditorium. This year's Halloween film is The Woman in Black. Admission is free, and popcorn and Kona Ice are free while supplies last.
There are two tight spots. The first is at 1 p.m., when BooHaHa ends and the Spooktacular begins in the same part of downtown, so families can walk straight from one to the other. The second comes at the end of the day, when the Spooktacular closes at 7 p.m. and the movie starts 30 minutes later at 825 Crawford Road. The city lists that address as a performance venue near Old Town, with free parking on site.
Main Street Has Scarers, and a Wristband for Opting Out
The Spooktacular is the longest stretch of the day at six hours, and the Visit Rock Hill listing includes a detail most event roundups leave out. The festival will have scarers walking around. If you'd rather not be scared, you can pick up a wristband at the info tent.
That wristband matters on a day built for every age group. Toddlers who just finished a BooHaHa costume contest share the same block with older kids looking for a jump scare, and the wristband lets each family choose its own level of fright.
The scarers also link Main Street to the evening. According to the Spooktacular page, scarer tryouts happen before the Fright Nights at McGirt Auditorium. So the people startling families on Main Street in the afternoon try out at the building that hosts the movie that night.
The Night Shift Belongs to a Renovated School Auditorium
The Fright Night page, published in August, says "This October we will be bringing Fright Nights to McGirt Auditorium." The building has a longer history than the series. The city's facility listing says McGirt Auditorium was originally part of Emmett Scott High School, which closed in 1970. It was renovated in 2024, seats 750, and connects to Emmett Scott Recreation Center by a covered walkway.
That gives Halloween night an indoor theater with fixed seating. Rock Hill's other outdoor film series, Movies in the Park, is still a separate event on the lawn at Fountain Park. It showed The Nightmare Before Christmas there on October 9.
The city is clear about who the Fright Night films are for. Every film is rated PG-13 and "not intended for younger audiences." That matches the day's order. The youngest kids get the late morning at Fountain Park, everyone shares the afternoon on Main Street, and the older crowd gets the 7:30 p.m. show on Crawford Road.
The Morning Is the One Open Question
Saturday mornings at Fountain Park usually belong to the Old Town Market, which runs 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Its season continues through November 21. Whether it runs on October 31 depends on which page you check. The fall events page lists the market for "All Saturdays in October." The market's own 2026 schedule lists October as "CANCELLED: 10, 17, 24, 31" and gives no reason. The same page says there are no markets on festival days.
Until organizers say otherwise, plan on BooHaHa at 11 a.m. as the start of the day. If you were hoping for produce from Pennington Produce or coffee from the York Coffee Roastery/Maxabilities booth before the costume contests, check the market page that week. Those vendors appeared on the September 26 roster, and the page notes the lineup can change. The schedule lists the market's next confirmed dates as November 7, 14 and 21.
Parking for a Day That Moves
Since the day starts downtown and ends on Crawford Road, the parking plan matters more than usual. The city's downtown parking page lists free decks, surface lots and on-street spaces.
- Elizabeth Lane Deck, 116 N. Elizabeth Lane, is the deck closest to Fountain Park.
- Black Street Deck is at 121 East Black Street.
- Free surface lots are at 120 East White Street and 237 East Black Street, among other downtown options.
For the movie, McGirt Auditorium has its own free parking, so you don't need a downtown space to make the 7:30 p.m. start.
Downtown parking is also expanding over the longer term. A new deck is under construction at the former Herald site on West Main Street. On September 28, Rock Hill City Council approved a $12.4 million contract for a second deck at White Street and Dave Lyle Boulevard, The Herald reported. Construction on the White Street deck is likely to start next summer and should take less than a year. The two decks are designed to hold up the ends of a pedestrian overpass, costing more than $8 million, that will cross Dave Lyle and the rail line beside it. None of that changes this Halloween, but in a couple of years, downtown events like this one should have more places to park.
The Weeks Leading Up, and the Sunday After
The Saturday on the 31st ends a month of smaller events. Fright Night has already shown Lights Out and A Quiet Place. Still ahead on the Friday schedule at McGirt Auditorium, all at 7:30 p.m.:
- October 16: The Mummy
- October 23: Five Nights at Freddy's
- October 30: The Addams Family, the night before the big Saturday
On Saturday, October 24, Rock Hill Parks, Recreation and Tourism and the York County Library host Firelight Fright Storytelling on the lawn at Fewell Park Recreation Center from 5 to 8 p.m. Admission is free, food trucks will be selling food, and the city suggests bringing a chair or blanket. Visit Rock Hill also lists Cherry Place Farms' fall festival every weekend in October, with a corn maze, pumpkin patch and hayrides, at $12 per person for ages 2 and up.
The day after Halloween, Sunday, November 1, Trunks or Treats runs from 3 to 7 p.m. at Boyd Hill Recreation Center. The city is looking for organizations, families and groups to decorate a trunk or table and hand out candy, and sign-ups are open through the fall events page. So the BooHaHa crowd that starts Saturday at Fountain Park gets one more trick-or-treat stop on the other side of town before the season ends.
In my Army years, every operation came down to timing and handoffs, and this Saturday runs the same way, from 11 a.m. at Fountain Park to 7:30 p.m. on Crawford Road. If your family has questions about this part of Rock Hill, or about where the White Street deck and overpass are headed, Trenette Tucker is glad to talk it through. Schedule Your Personalized Consultation.
