Riata
Inn I
Story and art by Reba Cross Seals
Hwy 67 N. • Presidio
Swimming pool
Wireless internet
Large rooms
King size beds
432.229.2528
Jett’s Grill
at the historic Hotel Paisano
serving dinner 5 to 9 p.m.
seven days a week
207 N Highland Ave • Marfa
432.729.3838
Skinner & Lara, P.C.
Certified Public Accountants
610 E Holland Avenue
Alpine, TX 79830
12
Cenizo
Phone (432) 837-5861
Fax (432) 837-5516
t was my first date with this
tall cowboy, and cute as he
was, I was leery when he
suggested that we go out and
look at the Marfa Lights. He
and I were freshmen at Sul
Ross, and I had never heard of
any ghostly lights near Marfa.
Still, I decided to take a chance
on something that sounded
intriguing on that frigid
November evening.
As we chased the last light
streamers of the day on U.S.
Hwy. 90 west of Alpine to
about 10 miles from Marfa, we
soon came to a place where my
new cowboy friend pulled off
the highway and said, “This is
it!” My glance must have told
him what I thought of the
viewing site, a bar ditch along a
highway!
Pointing to the south, he
directed me to be patient and
wait. As dusk spread her dark
skirts over the cactus, antelope
and distant mountains, I was
suddenly startled by lights in
the distance that appeared
where there had been none a
second before! My suspicious
nature made me ask if they
could be car lights coming up
the highway from Presidio. But
how to explain the moving
lights that were suddenly far
east of that highway, out over
the pastures and near the
mountains? If they were car
lights, they were moving
extremely fast over rough ranch
roads, and, strangely enough,
there were no pairs moving
together as car lights would
have been.
I was truly
impressed and looked at my
cowboy date with a little more
respect.
I remember the lights as
mostly white, but occasional
ones were red and orange. The
primary phenomenon to me
then, as well as now, is that they
would sometimes quickly
bounce up and down, occa-
sionally above the horizon.
First Quarter 2010
Occasionally two or three lights
would merge into one, then
appear to bounce forward,
coming closer to us. The dis-
tance from us seemed to be a
couple of miles.
Since that year several
decades ago when I first viewed
the phenomenon as a naive
teenager, I’ve seen and learned
a lot more about the Marfa
Mystery Lights and have
learned to respect them. For
one thing, they do not appear
on demand, and for another,
one cannot predict the quality,
length or power of their show -
if they do appear.
Now a resident of the
Alpine area, I have taken visit-
ing family and friends to the
lonely highway area to sit and
view the mysterious occurrence
numerous times. Sometimes
absolutely nothing happens,
and my guests appear to view
me with the same suspicion
that I once viewed an innocent
cowboy.
Yet other times during the
years, my visitors and I have
been rewarded with a spectral
light show, which has been
explained in all kinds of ways
by all kinds of people.
Suggestions have included
phosphorescent minerals in the
nearby mountains, swamp
gasses (in the desert?), static
electricity (which does show up
as lightning in time-lapsed pho-
tos), St. Elmo’s fire, car lights or
ball lightning.
Many other people explain
the lights by mentioning the
steep temperature changes
common in the area, which can
be as much as 60 degree’s
change in 12 hours, UFOs,
people with flashlights, old
Indian legends, reflective white
soil or simply paranormal ghost
lights. Some researchers have
pointed out the coincidence of
Marfa Lights having the same
latitude, 15 to 20 miles north of
latitude 30 degrees N, with the
mysterious Bragg Road lights
in the piney woods of East
Texas and abundant reportings
near Enchanted Rock in
Central Texas.
Numerous groups from
around the world have come to
study the phenomenon for
varying lengths of time with
various sophisticated equip-
ment. These mystery lights
have been prodded with lasers,
dusted with flour dumped from
planes, chased by jeeps with
walkie-talkies and zapped with
radar. But none of these exper-
iments has explained what is
visible to the human eye: the
lights’ ability to divide, merge,
blink, change colors, alter
movement patterns and vary
intensity levels.
The current official viewing
site is an extremely modern
roadside park built by the Texas
Department of Transportation
with the research help of a class
of gifted and talented high
school students from Marfa. It
is located about 10 miles east of
Marfa. The site is conducive to
sitting, for hours if necessary,
waiting with photographic
equipment for the exciting
experience.
I’ve wondered if my cowboy
ever returned to the area with
his family to tell the same story
of the night we saw the ram-
paging Marfa Mystery Lights.
Cars frequently line up along
the parking lot, and people visit
amiably with strangers, each
hoping to see something occur
that is as yet scientifically unex-
plained and may be a paranor-
mal event, as some devoutly
believe. Definitely the lights do
not show up every night on cue,
to the disappointment of many
passing tourists who curiously
stop by the viewing site on their
way to or from Marfa.
The only common denomi-
nator seems to be a night sky,
because they have appeared at
both dawn and dusk. The