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Set in the shadowed wilderness of Cumberland Gap, The Widow of the Gap tells the chilling tale of Elspeth Harper, a frontier woman whose husband got sick on the trail while crossing the mountains in the late 1700s. Heartbroken but refusing to leave, she stayed behind and camped at the edge of the Gap long after the settlers moved on. During a brutal storm, with no sign of Elspeth, her lantern was still burning, hanging from a limb.

Centuries later, travelers and night watchmen report seeing a pale woman wandering near the old wagon road, clutching a lantern that never goes out, her dress faded, hair loose and wild, walking the ridge-line with a light that doesn’t flicker. Locals say she still searches for her husband’s spirit, calling softly through the fog. Others whisper she’s not looking for him anymore—she’s looking for company.

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Out past Jonesville, Virginia, where Route 666 winds through the holler, an old swinging bridge still hangs over the Powell River, creakin’, swayin’, and whisperin’ to the night. They say a preacher fell there one stormy evening in 1939, and ever since, his lantern’s been seen driftin’ through the mist, hummin’ hymns for the dead.

Generations have heard the hooves, seen the light, and felt the boards tremble beneath their feet, but some say the bridge don’t just haunt, it hungers. Every few years, it takes another soul to keep the river quiet.

So if you ever find yourself drivin’ Route 666 after midnight and see a light swingin’ over the water…don’t stop, because that bridge always remembers who’s crossed her, and she always makes room for one more.