A safe place for vampires

Hearse owners and Dracula’s acolytes discover that they fit right in at Trick or Treat Festival.For most people, celebrating Halloween means dressing up in a costume and going trick-or-treating. But for vampires, it’s the time of year where they blend in -- no one thinks twice about their odd clothing, fangs or fascination with skeletons and coffins.

While many people came to the eighth annual Trick or Treat Festival at the Orange County Marketplace on Sunday dressed as superheroes, fairies, witches and animals, Mark Webb of Garden Grove and Michael Bloom of Westminster came as themselves.

They consider themselves vampires and belong to the League of Vampiric Bards, a Southern California gothic performance group. Bloom said he has thought of himself as a vampire since long before the term goth was coined.

Webb and Bloom were at Sunday’s event for the annual hearse procession and show. Bloom, a hearse collector and vice president of the Los Angeles Hearse Society, drove his 1975 Cadillac hearse, which was filled with rusty shovels, plastic body parts, skeletons and handmade wooden coffins.

Webb and Bloom said October is a busy month for them, but they also celebrate other holidays, such as Dark Christmas and Vampiric Valentine.

“About the only thing we don’t do is Arbor Day,” Webb joked. “Something about trees reminds us of stakes.”

Orange resident Robert Dean, owner of 12 hearses and member of Phantom Coaches -- another hearse collectors association -- said they’re busy with events the whole month of October.

“It was a cool event,” said Dean, who is the organization’s funeral director, a position other organizations might refer to as events coordinator.

Ethan Acres, an Englewood resident and new member of Phantom Coaches, only recently purchased his first hearse, a 1982 Cadillac.

“It’s a great group of people who all share a love for these misunderstood cars,” Acres said. He said his stepfather was a Southern Baptist minister who was involved with the local funeral home. Having grown up around hearses, Acres said, he always thought they were beautiful vehicles. To him they represent that “final leap into the unknown.”

The hearse procession began at 10 a.m., with more than 20 classic hearses, ambulances and limousines parading through the streets of Costa Mesa before arriving at the fairgrounds. Famed radio show host Dr. Demento was the grand marshal and also deejayed two music sets.

“It’s always a lot of fun,” Dr. Demento said of the event, which he has participated in since 2001. He said he loves getting out and meeting the people who listen to his radio show, which is broadcast on 50 stations around the country.

Other performers at the event included sword swallower David Markham, the Washboard Willy mobile musical show and the rockabilly band Dawn Shipley and the Sharp Shooters. As attendees enjoyed the live entertainment, many explored the hearse display and voted for their favorites.

Phantom Coaches member K.A. Aguilar of Lake Elsinore, who owns the 1990 Chevrolet Caprice Classic hearse that was voted most popular by a landslide, took home the grand prize, a 400-pound pumpkin carved to look like Dracula. It was created by professional carver Mike Valladao.

While the usual Market Place vendors peddled their goods alongside a few specialty Halloween booths, costumed children trick-or-treated and collected bags full of candy.

A new addition to this year’s festival was the blood drive sponsored by Providence St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Burbank, which stationed its van next to a booth selling coroner’s merchandise.

Vampires Webb and Bloom stayed away from the blood drive van.

“We’re here for withdrawals, not deposits,” Webb joked.

For more information on the League of Vampiric Bards and upcoming performances, visit www.lovb.com.

For more information on Dr. Demento, visit www.drdemento.com.

For more information on the Phantom Coaches, visit www.phantomcoaches.org.

* LINDSAY SANDHAM is the news assistant. She can be reached at (714) 966-4625 or lindsay.sandham@latimes.com.

20051031ip72a2knKENT TREPTOW / DAILY PILOT(LA)Sophie Claire Dimich, 11 months, casts a wary eye at a pair of pint-sized skeletons at the Trick or Treat Festival at the Orange County Market Place on Sunday. 20051031ip729hkn