Eclipse mania engulfs farmland and Amish communities in Kentucky

Mark Cansler, a Kentucky farmer, was somewhat bemused when he learned he had won the cosmic lottery.

As a vast 70-mile wide swathe of America, from Oregon in the west to South Carolina in the east, was plunged into darkness Mr Cansler's otherwise unremarkable 70-acre farm was at the centre of the madness.

According to Nasa, the point of greatest eclipse, where the sun and moon lined up most perfectly, was in Mr Cansler's field 11 miles outside the small town of Hopkinsville, previously only famous because it makes 60 per cent of the world's bowling balls.

"It's hot here in Kentucky, so we mostly spend our time looking for shade, not looking at the sun," Mr Cansler told The Daily Telegraph as he stood in an old wooden barn in the field, the sound of cows in the distance.

"There was never anything special about this field at all. We were fortunate it was fallow so it was a good opportunity to allow Nasa to come share it with everybody."

As the eclipse approached the space agency set up a command centre to observe and broadcast the celestial phenomenon.

Hordes of people descended on the field from around America and the world, some clutching eclipse glasses, others arriving in giant mobile homes that had to steer round the horse-drawn buggies of the local Amish community.

Next to an array of space age Nasa contraptions stood Ona The Voodoo Bone Lady of New Orleans, holding her slithering Chinese rat snakes Damballah and Ellegua.

"An eclipse generates a huge amount of energy which can be used for whatever purposes," said Ona, explaining why she had driven nine hours from New Orleans.

"Voodoo can be positive. There is so much hate and discord in the world now and I want to use it to pray for people."

As she prepared to channel the eclipse's energy Matt Bevin, The Governor of Kentucky, arrived in the field by helicopter.

"I'm just excited that the perfect place to watch it is right here in our state," he said. "For me, as a big kid, this is fun. I think we've got room for a couple million more people, it's great for the economy."

Around Hopkinsville residents were enthusiastically cashing in, renting out their homes, gardens and fields to campers for suitably stratospheric sums.

There were also indications of eclipse-induced religious fervor in the Bible Belt state. A sign outside one Baptist church read: "The eclipse is coming. So is Jesus!"

In Mr Cansler's field eclipse enthusiasts Charlie Ward, 29, and Andy Shartzer, 29, from New York, laid out a white sheet to observe a phenomenon called "shadow bands" that move across the ground just before totality.

"This has been on my bucket list since I was five," said Mr Ward.

"It's a primal thing you just have to see," said Mr Schartzer.

It was the first total eclipse on the US mainland since 1979, and the first coast-to-coast one since 1918.

Some 200 million people were within a day's drive of the path of of totality, meaning it was almost certainly the most observed and photographed ever, and the one with the most traffic gridlock.

It was also the first total eclipse to pass through such a populated are in the social media era.

Nasa had a plane follow the eclipse as it moved across the US and sent up balloons to film it, while astronauts made observations on the International Space Station.