A year ago, Marissa Mayer and her husband Zachary Bogue purchased the property, and rumors have been buzzing around the local community. Low-income housing would go up. A McMansion would be built for the family. A park would be created. A senior complex would be developed. No one knows the answer except for Marissa and Zachary, but it has been nice to think that something positive would go there.
Now there are grumblings that Marissa is staging the defunct mortuary as a haunted house for her elite group of Google and Yahoo friends (Schmidt, Brin, Paige, Wojcicki) and the whose-who of Silicon Valley. Every year, Mayer's backyard and home is transformed into a haunted house and blow-out party.
A few days after the annual Halloween party, Mayer and family are outside handing out movie-size candies and plush animals to the neighborhood kids. Ask any child in the Crescent Park/Professorville neighborhood, and her home is ground zero for trick-or-treaters wanting the movies sized candy bar in the neighborhood. She also puts Martha Stuart to shame with her professionally carved pumpkins and pumpkin patch in front of the home. It is a sight to be seen and every kid and adult in the neighborhood runs there to be part of the excitement.
But getting back to using the mortuary as a fun-haunted-house. While on-the-surface it seems like using a mortuary is a perfect place to create a haunted experience, it is also a place where many of us said goodbye to our loved ones. The community is small, and the number of funeral homes in the entire bay area can be counted on one hand. Most locals only had one funeral home option, Roller & Hapgood & Tinney. Your neighbors, your community, your friends have had to deal with some of the saddest and hardest experiences in their lives, in the exact spot where you will now be celebrating. Not only is it disrespectful to the memory of our loved ones, it's confusing and upsetting to the community at large who lost their loved ones and grieved there.
I hope the rumors are false and that you will not be opening the doors to the mortuary for your exclusive party.
I thank you for making your home open and welcome for the children on Halloween. I also thank you for being so generous to many local causes.
Fondly,
Your Professorville Neighbor