The Lantern House

In the quiet countryside of Ohio, there stood an old wooden house at the end of a dirt road. Locals called it The Lantern House. No one lived there for more than fifty years, not since the Dawson family vanished one stormy night in 1974.

People said that if you passed by after midnight, you could see a light moving inside, as if someone was still walking through the rooms with a lantern.

In 1981, a man named Henry Collins bought the property. He was a retired postman who had always dreamed of living somewhere peaceful. He didn’t believe in ghost stories and thought the talk about the Lantern House was just small-town gossip.

The first few weeks were quiet. Henry spent his days cleaning, fixing old doors, and repainting the porch. But every night, the same thing happened.

Around midnight, he would hear soft footsteps in the hallway. Slow, steady, and heavy. He tried to tell himself it was just the house settling, or maybe a raccoon in the attic. But the sound was too clear. It sounded like boots.

One night he decided to find out for himself.

He sat in his chair with a lantern lit, waiting for the sound. When the old clock struck twelve, the air in the room turned cold. Then he heard it — step… step… step… coming from upstairs.

He grabbed his lantern and climbed the creaking staircase. The sound grew louder until he reached the second-floor hallway. There were four doors. He opened the first one — empty. The second — empty. When he opened the third, the sound stopped.

Inside was an old rocking chair, slowly moving on its own.

Henry froze. He wanted to run, but his curiosity held him in place. The lantern’s flame flickered and dimmed. Then, from behind him, a whisper brushed against his ear.

“Don’t sit in my chair.”

He spun around, but there was no one.

The next morning, he packed his bags and drove into town to ask about the Dawson family. An old woman at the diner told him their story.

“George Dawson was a quiet man,” she said. “He worked the fields and kept to himself. But after his wife died, he changed. Folks say he started seeing shadows, talking to someone who wasn’t there. He carried a lantern every night, walking from room to room, saying he had to ‘keep her warm.’ Then one night, the light went out, and nobody ever saw him or his children again.”

Henry returned to the house that evening, feeling uneasy. He decided he would leave in the morning. But that night, the storm came.

The wind howled through the trees, and the windows rattled. Around midnight, the light in his lantern went out again. The air filled with the smell of smoke.

Then he saw it — through the dark hallway, a faint orange glow moving toward him. It wasn’t fire. It was a lantern, swinging gently in the air, carried by someone unseen.

Henry backed away as the light came closer. In the glow, he could make out a tall shadow of a man wearing an old coat and hat. The figure stopped just a few feet away.

“Why are you here?” the voice asked.

Henry couldn’t answer. The voice came again, deeper this time. “This house is not yours.”

The lantern’s flame flared suddenly, lighting up the whole room. For just a second, Henry saw faces — a woman and two children behind the man, pale and silent, watching him with hollow eyes. Then the light went out completely.

The next morning, the sheriff found Henry’s truck still in the driveway, but the house was empty. His tools, clothes, and food were all there, but there was no sign of him. Only his lantern, sitting on the kitchen table, still burning faintly.

A few years later, a new family tried to move in. They lasted one night. The father claimed that just after midnight, someone knocked on their bedroom door and whispered, “It’s my turn to keep the light.”

They left before sunrise and never came back.

Today, the Lantern House still stands, leaning against time. Travelers say they sometimes see a warm light glowing through its windows late at night, swaying gently from room to room.

No one knows if it’s the Dawson family, Henry Collins, or someone new trapped inside. But one thing is certain — the light never goes out.