Seeing history above: Thousands look to the sky at Jacksonville eclipse party

Thousands of eclipse watchers came together at the University of North Florida Monday afternoon as the moon made its slow but steady advance over the sun for an historic moment, craning their heads up to look through eclipse glasses, apart from a couple of independent-minded people who had old-fashioned cardboard box viewers.

By noon there were already a few hundred people there, even though the eclipse wouldn't begin until 1:47 p.m. It peaked at 3:05 p.m. with about 64% of the sun obscured by the moon and lasted until 4:19 p.m.

This was a pretty savvy and enthusiastic crowd, but even so UNF had to put out signs warning against looking directly at the sun. People complied.

Early on, through eclipse glasses, it looked as if a curved chunk had been taken out of the sun.

"It's like a Mr. Pac-Man," one student said.

As the peak approached, the sun looked like a crescent moon — impressive, though not on the scale of the total eclipse seen a few hundred miles to the west. Of course, noted Chris Kelso, an associate professor in the physics department who was on hand for the event, if you didn't know there was an eclipse over Jacksonville, you wouldn't even have noticed it.

Even so, Gabrielle Forbes, a member of the school's astronomy club, which hosted the watch party, was buzzing with excitement.

She explained: "It is a wonder in the universe. It's so beautiful to learn about and experience. I grew up in Miami, where there is a lot of light pollution, but even the few stars I was able to see, I used to make up constellations. That's all I had to work with."

Now, she said, "I get to learn about it in class then actually see it in real life."

How many people came to UNF's watch party?

Thousands. Action News Jax had a booth at the school where it was giving away 5,000 pairs of eclipse glasses. Throughout the party, there was a steady stream of people coming up to get free glasses, and with 20 minutes to go until the peak, all but perhaps a couple of hundred were gone.

By the peak, every single one of them was gone.

Figure that some people brought their own glasses, and that makes more than 5,000 there for the party.

Craig Davenport, Action News Jax's director of marketing and creative services, said the station was happy to give away the glasses — and mindful of its experience during the 2017 partial eclipse, for which they ordered 1,000 pairs of glasses to give away.

They ran out, quickly, and there was a huge traffic jam outside station headquarters near Town Center. Some disappointed people even cursed at station employees.

This time? Almost everyone who wanted a pair got one, and most people (but not all) even thanked them. Davenport smiled in satisfaction. "We came prepared."

Cardboard box was fine for the eclipse

Jimi Palmer and his son Max, 14, brought a box viewer they made from cardboard at an astronomy club meeting on the university campus. It was their second visit to the club; during the first one they heard a particle physicist talking about dark matter.

Max was asked what was it about astronomy that interested him. "There's a lot of things," he said. "But I'm not really — I'm more into quantum physics. Black holes are cool, I guess. I'm just, I don't know, all math and science."

Meanwhile, younger brother Oliver, 12, demonstrated how the box viewer worked, noting the pinhole viewer on the top that cast an image of the eclipse on a piece of white paper at the other end of the box.

He laughed: "Until your fingers get in the way."

The wonders of a total eclipse

Lidia DeAngelo, a third-grade teacher at Lakeside Elementary, was there with her son, Dominick, who would turn 15 the day after the eclipse. She had a Canon camera with a big lens topped off by a special filter that allowed her to safely photograph the sun.

She wanted to be on the lawn at UNF along with other eclipse buffs, part of something bigger than herself. "And I'm a UNF grad," she said. "It just kind of made sense."

In 2017 she traveled to South Carolina to be in the path of totality. "It was just unbelievable when everything goes dark and cold," she said. I have no words."

After seeing that, she said she understands how awesome an eclipse must have been to ancient people. "If you didn't know what it was, it would feel ominous," she said, " a major sign of something to come."

Kelso, the physics professor, saw the 2017 total eclipse from atop of a hill near Asheville, N.C.

"It literally looked like a wall of darkness was chasing towards you," he said. "I can completely see why ancient people thought this was like an army of darkness coming at you. It moves really quickly and once it reaches you, it's completely dark and you can look up and see the corona. And being up on a hill, it essentially looked like a 360-degree sunset, all around you."

He urged anyone to go see a total eclipse, if they have the means to do so. It's awe-inspiring, he said, though with memories of epic traffic jams to get back to Jacksonville in 2017, he decided to just watch this partial eclipse from home.

The partial eclipse at its peak

As the peak approached at 3:05 p.m., two UNF students who grew up in the Tampa Bay area as best friends since sixth grade were beaming with excitement.

"It's the coolest thing ever," said Cam Burge, who's studying construction management, as he watched through his eclipse glasses. "This is insane. It's nuts."

Look back: How close was Jacksonville to totality during the 1970 solar eclipse?

Davion Lumpkin, a business management student, was struck by the big crowd at the watch party.

"Everybody's getting together. It's kids over here, it's people's parents over here, teachers over here, students over here, everybody's over here," he said. "It's great to see everybody getting together, 'cause this is a university, so everyone's getting together to experience this. Seeing the eclipse is all that matters."

The partial eclipse, seen through glasses, was cool enough. But they vowed they would be in the path of totality for the 2045 eclipse, which will cover almost all of Florida but for the very northeastern portion (including Jacksonville) and the southern end of the state.

" I will be there," Burge said. "You can be sure of that."