C1 Online banking can lead to higher yields SPORTS Prep football action Sumter, Crestwood, Lakewood and REL all win on opening night B1 SERVING SOUTH CAROLINA SINCE OCTOBER 15, 1894 SUNDAY, AUGUST 20, 2017 $1.75 JOB GROWTH: Economist says state’s economy strengthens A9 TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE — MONDAY, AUG. 21, 2017 We’re on the path to totality Are you READY? ECLIPSE TIMES IN SUMTER PARTIAL ECLIPSE: Starts at 1:14 p.m. Totality not only thing and ends at 4:07 p.m. TOTALITY: Starts at 2:43 p.m. and ends at 2:45 p.m. Duration of totality is 1 minute, 46 seconds to watch for Monday CLOSINGS BANKS / CREDIT UNIONS: • SAFE Federal Credit Union will close BY JIM HILLEY from 2:35 to 2:50 p.m. [email protected] • Bank of Clarendon will close from 2:15 to 3:15 p.m. uring its last few min- • First Citizens will close from 2 to 3 p.m. utes on land, the shadow • The Citizens Bank will close the lobby of the moon will dash from 2 to 3 p.m., but the drive thru will D be open. across South Carolina and the • BB&T, NBSC, Wells Fargo, South State “Great American Eclipse” will be Bank and AllSouth Federal Credit Union will be open their normal business gone forever. hours. Being a bit of an LOCAL GOVERNMENT OFFICES: astronomy nerd, I • Palmetto Tennis Center and The City of have long looked Sumter Aquatics Center both close at forward to Mon- ILLUSTRATION COURTESY OF NASA noon. day’s eclipse. This illustration depicts the alignment of the sun, the moon and Earth, which only • All other City of Sumter offices and Years ago, during perfectly occurs about once every 18 months on average. Sumter County offices will be open the days of dial-up normal business hours. modems and • Lee County offices and City of Sumter Item Bishopville offices will be open normal 40-megabyte hard around to checking how far I The only real response was, I be- business hours. “eclipse expert” drives, I used the would have to travel to see the came The Sumter Item’s “eclipse JIM HILLEY • Clarendon County offices and City of newly accessible in- “Great American Eclipse,” I was expert.” Manning offices will close at noon. ternet to search for astounded to learn I would only As the moment neared, the OTHER: upcoming eclipses and discovered have to walk out my front door. eclipse hasn’t needed any help • The Sumter County Library will be this one. I vowed I would somehow I tried, seemingly in vain, to stir from me to generate excitement; open normal business hours. find a way to travel to see it. I be- up excitement among my co-work- It’s all over the newspapers, inter- • The Harvin Clarendon County lieved even then it would be a huge ers and acquaintances in the Pal- net and TV. Library will be closed event. metto State. Nonetheless, I won’t let that stop on Monday. In 2014, I moved from New Mexi- A typical response was, “That’s co to Sumter, and once I got very interesting, Jim.” SEE EXCITEMENT, PAGE A13 Fido doesn’t need glasses BY MELANIE SMITH perience Monday afternoon. [email protected] Wait. What about Mr. Wiggles? Does he need glasses? Where By now, you’ve probably would you get them? How to at- The S.C. stocked up on the proper solar tach them to his noggin? Emergency eclipse glasses, event T-shirts Relax. Fido likely won’t need Management and hats and have mapped out a them. That picture of my dog Division, on its Twitter feed, recently plan for your family to safely posted that it “does not take in the once-in-a-lifetime ex- SEE ANIMALS, PAGE A13 know if LIZARDMEN become more active during a solar eclipse, but Your dog won’t need solar eclipse glasses on Monday because animals don’t typi- we advise that residents of cally look at the sun, according to a meteorologist with The Weather Company. Lee and Sumter counties MELANIE SMITH / THE SUMTER ITEM should remain ever vigilant.” VISIT US ONLINE AT CONTACT US DEATHS, A12 WEATHER, A14 INSIDE Information: 774-1200 Mitchell C. Cottingham Carl S. Smith SUNNY, HUMID 4 SECTIONS, 32 PAGES the .com Advertising: 774-1246 Bobbie Jo Reaves James Houck Sr. VOL. 122, NO. 220 Classifieds: 774-1200 Partly sunny and humid. Alene B. Hawkins Emma Lou Thomas Tonight, partly cloudy Classifieds C8 Public Record C6 Delivery: 774-1258 William Jones Carlton Generette and humid. Comics D1 Reflections C4 News and Sports: Thomas Brown David R. Hanzlik 774-1226 Virginia L. Johnson Ina J. Pettigrew HIGH 95, LOW 75 Opinion A11 Sports B1 Larry Hannibal James Taylor Panorama A5 Yesteryear C5 A2 | SUNDAY, AUGUST 20, 2017 THE SUMTER ITEM Call: (803) 774-1226 | E-mail: [email protected] ECLIPSE TRIVIA • In American humorist Mark Twain’s novel “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,” Hank, a young engineer, is somehow transported back to the time of King Arthur. As he is about to be burned at the stake for failing to prevent Arthur’s death, Hank remembers a solar eclipse is about to begin. He exploits the people’s ignorance of the phenomenon, tells them he will turn the sun dark and destroy the Earth unless his life is spared. And that is exactly what happens when the sun is blacked out by the moon’s shadow, and Hank convinces the people he will make it come back. A film based on the book was released in 1949 with Bing Crosby as Hank. • The reason a total eclipse appears so perfect is that the sun is 400 times larger than the moon but also 400 times farther away from Earth — thus, a nearly perfect fit. • A total eclipse occurs only once every 360 years at any particular place on Earth — BUT, it may be true that the exception makes the rule. South Carolina — all of North America, in fact — experienced a total solar eclipse on March 7, 1970. • The moon shadow’s speed as it moves across the Earth is about 1,050 miles per hour. One suspects that Cat Stevens, whose song “(I’m Being Followed by a) Moon Shadow,” was not able to outrun it. • During the eclipse, as it grows darker, wildlife is likely to come out as it does at night. Pets, such as dogs and cats, may become confused, thinking it’s time to sleep — or be fed. Or they may show no unusual behavior at all. Experts: Some clouds Monday • During totality, we should be able to see the planets Mars, Mercury, Venus and tween 60 to 70 percent at eclipse time, Rohrbach said a front will be some- Jupiter. Meteorologist says chance of agency meteorologists said Saturday. where between Columbia and the • Looking directly at the sun at any time rain during eclipse day is low “It’s going to be kind of hit or miss coast Monday, and that’s why fore- other than the few minutes of totality with those fair-weather cumulus casters expect it to be cloudier than can severely damage your eyes — be BY JIM HILLEY clouds around,” he said. the Upstate. sure you’ve got protective glasses on. [email protected] Chances of rain will be about 30 He said forecasters are uncertain how • Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the percent, so any showers and thunder- the loss of radiational heating from the Heart” has been playing on radio stations There is good news and bad news storms will be scattered or isolated. sun will affect the cloud cover. and playlists for weeks, it seems. But for area eclipse watchers on Monday, In terms of which part of the state “It will make temperatures a little there are many other songs that at least said Meteorologist Chris Rohrbach might have the best conditions for cooler, and if we have cooler tempera- mention eclipses. Among them are: Carly from the National Weather Service in eclipse viewing, Rohrbach said fore- tures at the surface, it decreases the Simon’s “You’re So Vain,” when she sings Columbia. casters expect slightly less cloudiness mixing that creates those clouds, so “You flew your Learjet to Nova Scotia to The bad news: “I can tell you it’s in the Upstate. we might see a little subtle decrease in see the total eclipse of the sun ... “; she going to be at least partly cloudy that “It’s hard to say because we are ex- cloudiness,” he said. was referencing the March 7, 1970, day,” he said. “That’s at least some- pecting a cumulus field to develop with That will be after totality has gone eclipse. Manfred Mann’s 1976 song what disappointing news.” scattered clouds,” he said. “You could by, he added. “Blinded by the Light” could serve as a The good news is that the models be in the Upstate, where the cloud The high Monday is forecast to be reminder not to look at the sun without special glasses, although it doesn’t are trending drier, Rohrbach said, cover is expected to be less, but if you about 92 degrees — with a heat index specifically mention an eclipse. with lower chances of rain. get a towering cumulus cloud over you, of 100 degrees — so a little cooling The cloud cover is expected to be be- it doesn’t make much difference.” from the eclipse may be welcome. • Centuries ago, some people believed a solar eclipse could poison their food, blind everyone in its path and allow demons to possess their bodies.