Marfa Lights

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, somewhere out in Presidio County, there's a stretch of West Texas sky that just plain refuses to behave itself. Has been refusing for over a hundred years, far as anybody knows.

We're talking about the Marfa Lights. And before you go reaching for a simple explanation, I'll tell you this: folks a whole lot smarter than either of us have been reaching for that same explanation for generations, and they're still empty-handed. The lights are, officially, mysteriously and stubbornly unexplained.

The first time anybody wrote it down was 1883. Rancher Robert Ellison saw them. Now, what exactly Robert Ellison made of what he saw that night, the record doesn't say.

But somebody thought it was worth writing down, and that says something all by itself. Since then, the theories have stacked up like cordwood. Campfires.

Phosphorescent minerals. Swamp gas (out here in the Chihuahuan Desert, mind you). Static electricity.

St. Elmo's fire. Ghost lights, which is really just a fancy way of saying nobody knows.

The lights themselves don't seem to care what you call them. They change colors. They move around.

They brighten, they dim, they do as they please. And they have, by all accounts, been doing exactly this for over a hundred years. Scholars have catalogued more than seventy-five local folk tales built up around the phenomenon; seventy-five; which tells you something about what a hundred years of unexplained lights does to the imagination of a place.

West Texas will do that to you on a clear night even without the lights. Add something that won't be explained, and the stories just keep coming. Robert Ellison saw something in 1883.

People are still watching. Still talking. And out there past Marfa, the lights are still not saying a word.

What the marker says

The Marfa Lights, mysterious and unexplained lights that have been reported in the area for over one hundred years, have been the subject of many theories. The first recorded sighting of the lights was by rancher Robert Ellison in 1883. Variously explained as campfires, phosphorescent minerals, swamp gas, static electricity, St. Elmo's fire, and "ghost lights", the lights reportedly change colors, move about, and change in intensity. Scholars have reported over seventy-five local folk tales dealing with the unexplained phenomenon. (1988)