Nestled into the rich farmland in the southwest corner of the state, not far from the Tennessee and Illinois borders, a quirk of celestial geography has turned Hopkinsville, a city of about 30,000 people previously best known for black patch tobacco and a bowling ball factory, into the center of the sunless world.

The zoo’s animal observation event is aimed at finding out whether “animals behave differently when experiencing a total Solar Eclipse.” It may be too dark to discern confusion on the face of a meerkat.

The considerable excitement cutting a narrow band through the country was also accompanied here by dire warnings that stopped just short of werewolves: Alleged gas and food shortages haven’t materialized, and as of Sunday, traffic was heavier than usual but still a breeze by Boston standards.

At the DeBow Recreation Complex, a tent city sprang up over the weekend, as people from all over the country set up and sweated out a 95-degree afternoon in the path of humidity.

Tim Kearney, an amateur astronomer from Plymouth, left home with his daughter Elaine, who will soon start her sophomore year as a humanities major at Regis College, on Thursday in their Nissan Versa and rolled into Hopkinsville Friday night.