Jonathan Annear, of Plymouth, Mass., left, and Tim Vanderwarker, right, of West Warwick, prepare to scare as actors dress for a night of frights at the Trails to Terror Halloween attraction at Highland Farms in Wakefield.

THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL / Glenn Osmundson

SOUTH KINGSTOWN -- Lori Sousa got what she wanted for her birthday.

Custom-made fangs.

“I’ve been haunting for nine years,” the Johnston resident, 33, a director of this Halloween season’s Trails to Terror at Highland Farm, said one night last weekend. She pulled out her fangs to talk more comfortably about the 14 nights of “Cirque De Slay,” this year’s haunted hayride, and “Grim Fairytales,” a walk into the deep dark woods of what used to be the Sumner family farm.

It’s still a farm where greenhouses are filled with flowers, vegetable plants and gardening supplies in spring and summer, and there’s a farm stand offering fresh food and baked goods, too. The property also once held the art studio of the late Pearl Marsh, an early organizer of the Wickford Art Festival and Association who created portraits and paintings in the second-floor loft of this roadside hay barn.

“My mother and father bought the property in 1943,” recalls Jack Sumner, today’s farmer and proprietor. “It was a chicken farm, and right where the stand is now, there was nothing but a hayfield.”

He played in that hayfield, and now he works there, operating the business with his sister, Martha Bradley, of South Kingstown. With their staff, they offer Rhode Island-grown vegetables, unusual varieties of perennials, and in autumn, mums, pumpkins, and a cast of close to 70 actors who play by the scary book for long lines of fright-seekers.

“Twelve years ago when I started the farm stand, I did appointment-only hayrides, but I had to kick it up a notch,” Sumner said. So after hearing about a haunting convention in Chicago, he enrolled in its seminars and “learned quite a bit about how to put on a safe event and make money.”

Before long, he was seeking professional help by way of the want ads.

“I was slammed with calls from people who wanted to do this,” he says.

ONE PERSON EVEN wanted to do it for free, Sumner says, recalling meeting Larry Wilhelm, nicknamed “Scary Larry.”

These days, Scary Larry “pretty much runs the show,” says Sumner, the show being 14 nights of October darkness illuminated by bizarre circus acts and twisted fairytale scenes.

And there’s no shortage of people who want to be both the scarer, and the scaree.

“I’ve been doing this for 23 years,” said Edward Slotter, who worked in Halloween productions before and after graduating from South Kingstown High School, in 1992, and continues to haunt, as they say it. He works days as a quality control manager, nights as a Halloween terror planner and director.

“We start a year in advance, discussing ideas, because we have to,” he said. “We have 30 acres to cover. We build new every year.”

As he talked, he slathered white make-up on his face for his part as a freaky magician. A chain-saw sat at his feet.

Slotter, Sousa, Jason Storm, of Warwick, and Scary Larry, of Narragansett, who works days in planning at Electric Boat, Groton, are the go-to ghouls for this farmyard fantasy. Larry is the ringmaster.

“I focus on the people who are hard to scare but can be entertained,” Wilhelm said. “Scaring the girls is great, but I also look for the guys who are too cool to be scared.”

Wilhelm says he likes to pick out a guy, “laugh hysterically, tell him I like you, I’ll kill you last,” and wait for a reaction.

Wilhelm said he has worked at Electric Boat for 33 years, often in “top-secret” projects, and while he has enjoyed it, plans to retire to spend more time doing other things, one being devoting his time to scary projects.

“The Halloween stuff is like a never-ending creative process. We’re already working on next year’s program. You have to have a feeling for what the public wants, and give them value for the money they are spending.

“You can’t cheese on the sets.”

SOME NIGHTS there’s a 40-minute wait for the hayrides, despite having four tractors operating at once, said Slotter, guessing that people wait to participate because “it’s an escape, a chance to be outside of the normal world.”

“I’m a twisted Red Riding Hood,” said Ashlee O’Connor, 26, of Narragansett. “I always wanted to act, and with this, I don’t have to be Shakespearean,” she said, hamming up a proper Elizabethan accent.

For college freshman Robert Asplint, of Cranston, who was waiting to be transformed into the Big Bad Wolf as soon as darkness fell, playing the scary part is half enjoyment of the holiday, half a way to make money. He’s a culinary arts student at Johnson & Wales University in Providence.

“It pays the bills,” he said.

It also helps with the farm bills, said Sumner. “I’ve got to pay taxes on 30 acres and I’ve got to buy tractors and equipment. I’ve got to sell a lot of tomatoes and corn. It takes money to maintain this farm.”

Sumner says farmers “have to try anything.” Someday, he predicts, the only money-making farms in Rhode Island are going to be turf farms.

Sumner said that while he draws crowds for the Halloween event from all over the state and Massachusetts, those same people don’t tend to stop in to buy a pound of tomatoes. “I have a lot of customers, but it’s a tough racket.”

Still, his phone rings nonstop with questions about the Halloween event. Will it be on despite the rain? (No.) Where do you get tickets (At the farmstand.) It goes on.

LORI SOUSA continued to paint her rag-doll face with a make-up brush, half cutesy, half scary.

“You never know what’s under that smile,” she said of her character.

By day, Sousa is mom to two children, ages 9 and 2, and this is her way of combining the thrill of acting with a paycheck.

Slotter concurs.

“It’s a job, and if you get paid to do a job, you do it very seriously,” he said.

“There’s a sense of pride.”

Admission is $12 each for “Cirque de Slay” and “Grim Fairytales," with a combination ticket of $18. Trails to Terror will be open tonight and Sunday from 7 to 10 p.m., and tomorrow and Saturday from 7 to 11 p.m

The attraction will not be open on Halloween, but Sumner said from 5 to 7 p.m. he will have a special Halloween event for little children. No scares, just a hayride of fun and music, notes a flier. The cost will be $8, parents free, and treats will be given out.

For more information on either event, call (401) 792-8188 or check www.trailstoterror.com

afleming@projo.com