Marfa Lights

Robert Reed Ellison was a young cowhand driving cattle through Paisano Pass when he saw the flickering light and wondered whether it was an Apache campfire; settlers told him they had searched and never found ashes. In the summer of 1919 cowboys rode over the mountains looking for the source, and during World War II pilots training nearby hunted for it from the air. The likeliest explanation is a mirage-like effect, cold and warm air layers bending light. A roadside viewing area nine miles east of Marfa became a viewing center in 2003.

What the plaque says

Marfa Lights 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)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Marfa Lights Viewing Area — steps away
  The roadside viewing area on US 90 nine miles east of Marfa, where people gather after dark to watch the horizon toward the Chinati Mountains for the Marfa lights.
• Presidio County Courthouse — 8.7 mi
  Marfa's domed courthouse of 1886, a Second Empire landmark finished in time for a New Year's ball, its statue of Justice still missing the scales someone shot away.
• Chinati Foundation — 8.8 mi
  Donald Judd's museum on the grounds of old Fort D. A. Russell in Marfa, where art, buildings and land are meant to be seen together, by guided tour.
• Museum of the Big Bend — 15 mi
  The museum of the Big Bend region and northern Mexico on the Sul Ross State University campus in Alpine, back since 2007 in its native-stone building of 1937.

More markers nearby

• Site of Marfa Army Air Field — steps away
• Paisano Pass — 3.9 mi
• Marfa Stockyards — 7.6 mi
• Presidio County — 7.7 mi