Eau Gallie's Halloween Wagon Ride Stops Where the District Began

Halloween in the District returns to the Eau Gallie Arts District on Saturday, October 24. It has merchant trick-or-treating, a costume contest and a ticketed wagon ride that its organizers call a tour of "spooky/haunted places in EGAD." The wagon makes three stops: Rossetter House, Houston Cemetery and the State Bank of Eau Gallie. Each one is a real piece of the town that grew up along Highland Avenue before anyone called it Melbourne. Taken together, the three make a short history of Eau Gallie, with Halloween as the reason to hear it.

The ride doesn't come from a haunted-house company. The host is the Eco Collective, the nonprofit behind Verdi EcoSchool, which describes itself as a "project based, not-for-profit urban farm school" in the historic arts district. Actors from Mystery Club HQ play the characters at the stops. The same school runs The Dark Garden, the October horror show at Thornfield Nursery. So most of the district's Halloween calendar this year comes from one small school a few blocks from the sites it brings to life.

The route, block by block

Every stop sits on or right next to Highland Avenue, so the route is short:

1. Rossetter House Museum & Gardens, 1320 Highland Ave. This year it hosts a pumpkin patch and concessions, and some listings treat it as the event's home base.
2. Houston Cemetery, half a block south of the Rossetter House, on the west side of Highland between Old Oak Street and Shady Lane.
3. The former State Bank of Eau Gallie, 1437 Highland Ave., on the southeast corner of Highland Avenue and Eau Gallie Boulevard.

The stops also run roughly in historical order. They start with a family that settled here in 1859 and end at a bank that opened its brick building in 1925.

Stop one: a house built on a pioneer's frame

Today the Rossetter House is linked to the Rossetter family, but its oldest wood belongs to someone earlier. A Brevard County Historical Commission oral-history transcript credits the earliest part of the house to Eau Gallie pioneer John Carroll Houston. It says the rear section may be older than the Civil War, and it records a descendant's account that Houston built it from lumber salvaged off shipwrecks.

James Wadsworth Rossetter and his wife, Ella, came to Eau Gallie in 1902 with their daughters, Caroline and Ella. The same county transcript says James bought the property in 1904 and added the two-story front, finished in 1907. The museum dates the restored house to 1908. These dates probably describe different building phases more than a disagreement. The family grew to five children, with sons James, Appleton and Charles. James died in 1921. Caroline and Ella kept the home and its contents, and according to the museum they worked to preserve it as a historic monument.

That's why the house is still standing to host a pumpkin patch. Today the Rossetter House Foundation owns it and the Florida Historical Society manages it.

The ghost story at this stop is about a person who worked there. A 2017 Viera Voice piece on Brevard's haunted places repeats a legend that a gardener and handyman still walks the grounds doing his chores. Florida Today has also reported a story about an apparition said to appear near an intersection by the house.

Stop two: the family plot half a block away

The Houston name links the first stop to the second. The museum says the Houston family set up its homestead in 1859 at a place called Arlington, which later became Eau Gallie. It also says John Carroll Houston opened Brevard County's second post office in 1871.

Twelve graves remain in the family cemetery. The museum's burial list names Samuel L. Houston, John Carroll Houston, Mary Virginia Houston, Bonnie Houston and Susan E. Houston, along with Maud Bertha Young and Maudena Belle Braddock. Five children of the Roesch family are also buried there, including Mary H. Roesch and Earl Leroy Roesch. The Roesch name shows up again when you arrive at the museum. Visitors are told to check in at the Roesch House, across from the Rossetter House.

The founding date depends on which source you read. The museum says the cemetery was established in 1865. The marker at the site says it began in 1883, when Samuel Houston died on February 17. A local historic-trail write-up says burials stopped before 1920, when Eau Gallie Cemetery took over. In 1947 the Houston family deeded the plot to the Eau Gallie Garden Club.

Eau Gallie Cemetery is a different place from this family plot. Most of the local paranormal reports point to Eau Gallie Cemetery. A 2015 Florida Today piece described an investigator who said a female voice answered a question there, and a witness who remembered seeing a shadow figure. The article dates that cemetery to 1902, on land donated by William Gleason. The sources we reviewed don't attach a ghost story to the Houston plot. Its pull on the tour is how old it is.

Stop three: a bank that lasted three years in its own building

William H. Gleason, the same name tied to Eau Gallie Cemetery, was president of the State Bank of Eau Gallie when it was organized in 1913. The local historic-trail account says the bank moved into its new brick building in 1925 and closed in 1928. So the building at Highland and Eau Gallie Boulevard has spent nearly a century as something other than a bank.

Florida Today has reported that people describe hearing strange voices inside the building, which later housed restaurants. Its current tenant is FM Pizza Oven, which calls its space a historic former bank building and says it opened its first standalone pizzeria in 2019. The restaurant's own site says the building has been part of the district since 1922, a few years earlier than the 1925 date on the historical marker. If the wagon ride leaves you hungry, the last stop is also a place to eat.

How October 24 lays out

Florida Today's September 29 story describes Verdi EcoSchool as small but ambitious. It calls the school's adult show "a theme park-quality horror experience" and notes the school also made a gentler version for younger visitors. Here's how Space Coast Living lays out that Saturday:

Downtown's trick-or-treat is over by 2 p.m., and Eau Gallie's merchant route starts at 4. That leaves time for a family to do both districts and still make the costume contest. Prizes are offered for best family or group costume, spookiest and most creative. Wagon rides need a ticket and a signed waiver. The pages we reviewed don't list a ride price.

The Dark Garden, back for a second run

The adult show, The Dark Garden: Undergrowth, is an 18-and-up immersive horror experience at Thornfield Nursery. It runs seven nights between October 9 and October 30. Dates visible on the ticket page include October 9, 10, 16 and 17, and a separate date page confirms October 30. Florida Today calls it a return to EGAD. An earlier version ran on October 25, 2024, created by Verdi EcoSchool with Mystery Club HQ and recommended for ages 13 and up. According to the ticketing page, proceeds go to the school.

The kids' version, The NOT SO SCARY Dark Garden: Undergrowth, costs $10 plus a $0.25 service fee.

Where the listings disagree

Before you leave the house, check these details. Different listings give different answers:

• Adult Dark Garden price. Verdi's event page shows $20 plus a $0.50 fee. The Zeffy checkout it links to shows $25 general admission.
• Family Dark Garden date. Verdi lists October 24, 5–6 p.m. The EGAD calendar shows an opening-night family session on Friday, October 9, 5:30–6:30 p.m.
• Halloween in the District home base and start time. Verdi's listing puts it at Rossetter House, 1320 Highland Ave., from 4 to 8 p.m. The EGAD calendar lists Eau Gallie Square Park, 1452 Highland Ave., from 4:30 to 8 p.m.
• Rossetter House hours. The museum's FAQ says Wednesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Its directions page says 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

If the wagon ride leaves you wanting more of the Houston and Rossetter story, the museum offers guided tours Wednesday through Saturday at 10 a.m., noon and 2 p.m. Tours cost $15 per person, require a reservation made 24 hours ahead, and drop to $10 per person for groups of 10 or more. Two other October Saturdays bring people back to the same streets. The Brevard Collective Night Market fills Eau Gallie Square Park on October 10 from 3 to 8 p.m., with more than 30 local vendors. Indian River Lagoon Fest takes over Front Street Park on October 17 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Part of loving Eau Gallie is knowing that the pumpkin patch sits behind a house built on a pioneer's frame. If you own an older home near Highland Avenue and want to know how its history and location shape its value today, Milly Akins is happy to walk you through it, in English or Spanish. Get your free home valuation and we can start there.