View from the
cemetery, looking south. The lights are supposedly located on the
road near this point. |
Eighteen miles southeast
of Hamlin, at the junction of US-180, sits Anson, named in honor of
Dr. Anson Jones, the last president of the Republic of Texas. Anson
was also a stop on the legendary Butterfield Stage U.S. Mail route
that ran between St. Louis and San Francisco from 1858 to 1861, but
these days it feels more like a stage set for The Last Picture Show,
with handsome blocks of brick-fronted buildings forming a square around
the stately Jones County Courthouse at the center of town.
Anson is still a center for the local cotton industry,
but its main claim to fame is the Cowboys’ Christmas Ball, described
in an 1890 poem by William Lawrence "Larry" Chittenden
and recently re-awakened by the involvement of country-folk singer
Michael Martin Murphey, who did a Christmas show there in 1995. The story was covered by the television series Unsolved
Mysteries several years ago. Many residents from Anson and the nearby
town of Abilene have gone to witness these phenomenal lights. .
The cemetery is located going towards the country. The lights are
viewed by driving down the dirt farm road equivalent of about a
half mile or more. As you drive closer to the cemetery towards the
lights they disappear. |
View of Hwy 180,
looking north. Cemetery fence is on the right. |
As locals tell it, one night
during the Depression a young mother ran frantically along the road
searching for her missing child, slipping in icy ruts as she stumbled
through the cold winter darkness. She never found her little one;
the child had wandered away from the house and was presumed to have
frozen to death. The mother's spirit still searches for her child,
holding her lantern high to light her way in the dark night.
Yet another version of the story
has the "son" much older and working for the railroad.
The mother and son had a signaling system of sorts using a lantern.
when he arrived back he would flash his lantern three times towards
the house to let his mother know that he was on his way home.
Ghost hunters frequent Anson in search of
the “Lights of Anson”, a phenomenon that appears at the Mt. Hope
Cemetery and is featured in the book Ghosts in the Graveyard by
Olyve Hallmark Abbot and in Texas Monthly. |
The location
of the deserted tracks. They follow a power line that parallels
the road. |
This was
a full scale investigation to determine if paranormal activity does
indeed exist at the cemetery near Anson Texas.
The conclusion of two previous investigations conducted
at the location revealed a mysterious ghost light. The lights are
viewed by driving down the dirt farm road to the cross roads, equivalent
of about a half mile or more. As you drive closer to the cemetery towards the
lights they disappear. As for the actual story for this occurrence,
is unsolved. Local myth says that this light is the ghost of a mother
carrying a lantern looking for her missing child. The child had
left the house on cold winter day and was lost and froze to death.
The mother's spirit still searches for her child. Other myths claim
that the child or children were killed by a train.The cemetery is reached by driving east from Anson
on Highway 180. We got to the dirt road turnoff and proceeded down
to the cross roads, turned around, killed the headlights and engines
of our car, and looked around for ANYTHING that could be construed
as a "supernatural" light.
We didn't see anything, so
we flashed our headlights three times and waited. After a few seconds,
a light began to feebly glow a ways down the road. It appeared to
be orange, looking very similar to an arc-sodium street lamp or
such viewed at a distance. After a bit of time, the color gradually
changed to a bluish hue-similar to the xenon headlamps in some cars.
After a bit more time had passed, the light-which
appeared to be anywhere from 200 yards to a half-mile away-slowly
faded out. We wondered if we could bring it back if we flashed our
lights at it again, and sure enough, when we did, it gradually reappeared.
So we begin by seeing if the elements of the local myths could be
somewhat accurate.
We started by confirming the existence of railroad
tracks, which do exist, but they are located approximately half
a mile to the south of the crossroads. It was from this vantage
point that we noticed the layout of the surrounding terrain. The
area where the crossroad is located is actually in a depression. |
 |
One of the biggest questions that arose
that concerned the light occurred during our second investigation of the
area. One investigator was down on the road by the cemetery while the
rest of the investigations team were at the crossroads observing the light.
The investigator at the cemetery was not able to see the light itself
or obtain any differences in temperature . The entire are also had normal
background readings considering a power line parallel the road.
Later it was determined that the light only appeared on the left hand
side of the road, as viewed from the crossroads but seemed to be completely
invisible to someone standing down by the cemetery. The light also disappears
as one tries to approach it from the crossroads.
We also noticed that the light also appeared on its own, without having
to "flash" it with the car lights. Something seemed to be out
of place.
 |
On this investigation we focused
on trying to determine exactly where the light was located down
on the cemetery (north) end of the dirt road. We accomplished this
by sending a investigator with a flashlight up to the north end
of the road while another investigator stayed at the crossroads.
Through radio communication the
"crossroads investigator" was able to direct the "Cemetery
Investigator" so that his flashlight was positioned directly
over the ghost light. when the cemetery investigator looked to the
north, he could clearly see the light next to the foliage on the
other side of HWY 180.
It is definitely a light in the
distance, although it is quite bright. By now, the "cemetery
investigator" is standing down in the left ditch, far off of
the dirt road itself.
The foliage on the other side of
HWY 180, conceals the light when someone is looking north from or
near the road on the cemetery end. |
The ghost light, when viewed through a video
camera with the zoom on maximum, can also be easily identified as car lights.
You can even make out other cars traveling behind it, which is not readily
visible to the naked eye. If you look carefully you will sometimes make
out multiple lights, all determined by how many cars are traveling on HWY
277 at that particular time.
Another interesting effect can be obtained by having
someone stand across HWY 180 and shine a flashlight down the road towards
the crossroads. You would be surprised by how bright it appears and by
the way that it looks exactly like the ghost light itself.
 |
Other FAQ on the Optical
Illusion
How does the ghost light "fade"
in and out?
If you travel south on HWY 277 from Stamford to Anson, you will
notice that several sections of the road go uphill. This provides
the illusion of the light" fading in". To see what I mean,
simply go and observe a car heading up hill from the other side
of the hill. As the cars gradually turn to the southwest just outside
of Anson, the illusion works in reverse.
Why does the ghost light disappear
when it is approached from the crossroads?
To reach the cemetery from the crossroads, you must first go up
a slight hill. This creates a blind spot that exists until you have
climbed the hill, but by then the road as veered just enough to
the northwest that the light is obscured by the vegetation on the
other side of HWY 180, unless you drive down into the ditch on the
left side of the road.
How does the ghost light "move
about"? Many people have reported it.
First of all it should be mentioned that "seeing the lights"
is practically a college rite of passage for several of the local
colleges in Abilene, 11 miles south of Anson. I have already mentioned
how a simple flashlight can be used to imitate the light. Another
possible explanation comes from the few points of reference available
at the crossroads. The main one is a streetlight located at a private
residence just south of the cemetery. The light can be partially
obscured by trees and the wind moving the tree branches can cause
a illusion that the light is moving. The actual car lights do actually
move, although not much, as they travel down the highway. Others
have reported that the light actually moves down the dirt road towards
them. Once again this is due to the varying degrees of |
brightness of the car headlights.
A car with its lights dimmed can turn on its high beams, thus creating an
effect that seems as if the light is moving closer.
|
