The Truth About: The Hornet Spooklight

Just What Is the Mysterious Flickering Ball of Light That Haunts Missouri’s Devil’s Promenade?

Legend tells how wandering spirits of the dead will appear as “ghost lights,” appearing in the atmosphere without plausible explanation. These lights are said to also be connected to the devil and fairies. One such example in folklore would be the will-o’-the-wisp, often appearing to travelers near swamps and bogs. Some even connect them with UFOs. While these lights are legend, however, one has been verified to actually “exist” — The Hornet Spooklight, appearing for over 100 years at the Devil’s Promenade on the border between Missouri and Oklahoma, west of the eponymous town of Hornet. But are spirits really at work around the Ozarks, or is there a far more mundane explanation?

The Spooklight, also known as the Joplin Spooklight or the Tri-State Spooklight, resembles a single ball of light or several lights grouped so closely together as to be almost indistinguishable. Described variously as green, orange, yellow, red, or even blue, the color fluctuates between accounts, with some saying that the light resembles that of a camping lantern as if held aloft by some unseen hand. Most observations of the light are from a distance; however, some claim to have witnessed it up close, while most agree…