Students, staff and other local residents gathered together in the quad to attend a free rare solar eclipse viewing party event hosted by Harper College on April 8. Thousands of people of all ages came together to witness the rare solar eclipse, where Palatine had a maximum coverage of 93%.
The event began at 12:30 p.m. and had activities for everyone, including telescopes for viewing, free food, informational and craft booths, photo opportunities, dance showcases and more. Complementary solar eclipse glasses were handed out to attendees to provide safe viewing of the sun during the event. Many people brought their lawn chairs and blankets to get settled in
for the unique celestial event.
Besides the other attendees, community organizations came to attend the viewing party as well, including representatives from the public libraries in the area such as the Arlington Heights Memorial Library, the Palatine Library District and the Schaumburg Township District Library.
With the Schaumburg Library currently under renovation, their Programs and Exhibits Manager Stephanie Driscoll said that this party was a unique and timely opportunity for them to partner with Harper.
“This event is really well organized,” Driscoll said. “They’re able to fit a ton of people and have a bunch of different stations, so I think it’s going really well!“
The library had a booth with colorful markers and space-themed coloring pages for children, similar to many other booths placed around the quad which contained crafts for younger attendees, as well as further information about the solar eclipse and how to view it safely.
The booths were just one of many activities around the quad available to the public. Hundreds of people lined up for free food which included pretzels, pizza slices and eclipse-themed treats like moon pies and cosmic brownies.
For those looking for a clearer view of the eclipse, attendees were welcome to make use of telescopes set up in the quad. And for those looking for a different kind of spectacle, they could watch the Harper College Dance Company showcased a moon-inspired dance, or take advantage of the Star Wars characters walking around for the opportunity to take a photo.
A member of the 501st Midwest Garrison cosplay group, Joe Bialek attended the eclipse in full Stormtrooper AT-AT pilot gear along with fellow garrison members who were dressed in a wide-range of Star Wars inspired costumes.
“We’re a costuming group that does a lot of charity work, a lot of hospital visits and a lot of the geek stuff,” Bialek said. “All we do is go out and try to make smiles and raise money!”
Seeing as the last eclipse in the area took place in 2017, many Harper students – such as sophomore Eve Garcia – were excited about this opportunity.
“I’m glad that we got to do something like this!” Garcia said. “The last solar eclipse, I was in middle school so we didn’t really get to do anything!”
Harper hosted an event for the 2017 eclipse as well, and with only 6 weeks of planning, 1,000 people showed up. Keeping the lessons learned from the last eclipse in the back of her mind, event organizer and Harper physics professor Raeghan Graessle decided that she was going to make this viewing party that much more special.
“We were like, ‘What if we plan way ahead of time? What sort of event can we have that’s combining learning, love of learning, outdoors, astronomy?’” Graessle said. “It’s great! […] With this weather? We’re hoping to beat the 1,000 [attendees] from the last time!”
With the sunny weather being so cooperative and the greater degree of planning, this eclipse party indeed knocked 2017’s attendance out of the park – an total of 5,750 glasses were handed out throughout the event.
