Today, the town of Silver Cliff, Colorado, has a population of only 100 people. Once, however, it was a prosperous mining town where thousands came with dreams of finding silver and making their fortune.
Late one night in 1880, a group of miners were headed back to their camp after a good time in town. They were still laughing and joking as they approached the graveyard on a hill outside Silver Cliff. Then one of the men screamed and pointed toward the graveyard. The others looked and fell suddenly silent. On the top of each grave, they saw flame like blue lights.
These eerie lights seemed to be dancing on the graves, disappearing and then appearing again. This was the first sighting of the blue lights of Silver Cliff. There have been many other sightings over the years. In 1969, Edward Lineham from National
Geographic magazine visited the graveyard. Lineham’s article tells of his experience: “I saw them… Dim, round spots of blue-white light glowed ethereally among the graves. I… stepped forward for a better look. They vanished. I aimed my flashlight at one eerie glow and switched it on. It revealed only a tombstone. Lineham and others have suggested various explanations for the blue lights of Silver Cliff: The lights might have been reflections of lights from the town, but Silver Cliff’s lights seemed too dim to have this effect. The lights could have been caused by radioactive ore, but there’s no evidence of radioactivity. They could have been caused by the burning of gases from rotting matter, but this normally happens in swamps, and the area around Silver Cliff is dry. Or, perhaps, the lights are lights on the helmets of dead miners wandering the hills in search of fortune they had come for.