Please note: A expanded version of this story appears in our book Haunted Marion, Ohio.

It’s around ten o’clock on a summer night, and Seth and I are walking through the cemetery trying to locate one particular grave. Seth is confident we’ll find it, even in the dark. Slowly, a vague white shape materializes ahead of us. “There she is,” Seth says. “Do you think her eyes will really glow?”

The grave marker at night. The green patches were the spots that luminesced after being exposed to a strong light.

I first heard the story from Joe Howard, a local ghost hunter, during a talk he gave at the Marion Public Library in 2007. The story goes that the angel standing atop this particular Marion grave has glowing eyes.

Here’s the kicker: the eyes really do glow at night! Seth and I saw it for ourselves.

The story Joe told was actually a story he had heard from a local police officer. The story, as best as I can remember it, went something like this: officers who knew about the strange characteristics of the angel would prank unsuspecting rookies by driving up to the monument at night and finding an excuse to have to rookie approach the statue. When the unsuspecting rookie got within a few feet of the statue (which was now brightly illuminated by the patrol car headlights), the officer in the car would suddenly turn off the headlights, leaving the rookie to face a statue with glowing green eyes.

It’s a good story, and actually pretty funny, but I had my doubts about it. Police officers pranking rookies? Maybe. But a statue with glowing eyes? That’s a little tougher to believe. But then Joe said something that changed my mind.

“Of course, the car headlights are what make the prank work,” he said. “Something – moss maybe – growing on the statue absorbs the light, and by the time the officer in the car shuts off the lights, the eyes are already glowing.”

Even without the glowing eyes, this is one of the more striking grave markers in the Marion Cemetery.

When Seth and I get to the statue, the eyes aren’t glowing of course. But we’ve brought a huge flashlight. I shine the light on the face and tell Seth to shut his eyes so they’ll stay adjusted to the dark. “Okay,” I say,”open them!”

And the eyes are glowing! It’s a dull, greenish glow. And while we both know there’s a scientific explanation for what we’re witnessing, it’s still singularly unnerving.

“Okay, let’s get out of here,” I say, “before a cop sees the light flashing on and off over here in the cemetery after it’s closed and comes to investigate.” Of course, there’s a possibility that any cop who finds us at this particular grave with a huge flashlight might already have an idea of what we’re doing…