Eclipse draws workers outside in downtown Sarasota

In Sarasota, the solar eclipse in the mid-afternoon sky was matched by an equally rare sight on the city's streets.

Beginning around 2 p.m., workday crowds darted out from their downtown offices and restaurants to see the partial coverage of the sun as the moon passed in front of it on the afternoon of Aug. 21. Though Sarasota didn't experience the rare night-like conditions of large swarths of the county that saw a total obstruction, it didn't deter the local crowds that went to look at the sky.

The onlookers, almost entirely adults, wore boxy dark sunglasses or toted boxes of Cheerios and Cap'n Crunch converted into makeshift pinhole projectors so they could watch the eclipse safely. On the ground, Main Street's trees left a surreal curvature to its shadows, brought about by the partially obscured sun. There was an unnatural feeling to one of nature's most celebrated phenomena.

The eclipse altered school plans locally and travel plans across the country as the hype for the eclipse dominated conversations on televisions and offices for weeks. Still, the sight of a city's work force lining downtown sidewalks on a Monday afternoon was, like the eclipse itself, a once-in-a-century sensation.