A teenager’s spooky haunted house benefits the forgotten soldiers

PALM BEACH COUNTY, Fla. “A teenager from Palm Beach County is.” scare people for a good cause. That’s how Jonah Wides spent his Friday and Saturday nights.

“We’re just doing a haunted house to raise money for the Forgotten Soldiers,” he said.

Forgotten Soldiers Outreach is a nonprofit organization that sends care packages to soldiers overseas. The organization is dear to his family.

“My dad’s grandfather was in the military, so I just wanted to do it for him,” Wides said.

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Jonah’s mother, Sheryl Wilk, said the nonprofit has been part of their family for years.

“When he was a kid, I used to volunteer with them — when I had a lot more time — and so I would bring him in the stroller and help them with care packages for the Forgotten Soldiers,” Wilk said.

Together they turned almost every inch of their Winston Trails home into a haunted house. The project was a year in the making.

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“Putting up the walls, covering the furniture, moving things around because, believe it or not, this is our house, so we had to find a way to make it work,” Wilk said.

It was a labor of love with a big goal in mind.

“I’m trying to raise $500 or more to help the soldiers,” Wides said.

Nearly $700 later, every scare paid off.

“It was a lot of fun,” said one community member. “To see the high school students put in the time and effort to do this so they can collect the donations, write the letters, it’s just fantastic to see.”