When James Galloway planned to attend the rally, he expected to be among his peers. But when the sophomore in environmental technology arrived Saturday to an estimated crowd of 200,000 people, he was surprised at what he found.

“I wanted to be a part of something that was about sanity and goodwill as opposed to anger,” Galloway said.

The Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, held by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, began at the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

The event started at noon Saturday, but hundreds of people camped out all night in hopes of getting a spot near the stage. Once it reached noon, the crowd enjoyed a live performance from the Roots.

The hosts from Mythbusters, a popular show on Discovery Channel, came out to speak with the crowd after the Roots ended their set. They cracked jokes about various things, including the science involved in such a large crowd and the hosts of the rally itself. The duo also managed to start a massive wave throughout the crowd.

“The crowd was extraordinary. I had never seen so many people in my life. The streets weren’t officially closed, but it may as well have been because there were people lined up from sidewalk to sidewalk,” Galloway said.

Every race, age and ethnicity seemed to be represented throughout the mass of people, Galloway said.

“I was expecting it to be mostly young people,” Galloway said. “The crowd was pretty evenly distributed between really young people, people our age, and all the way up to senior citizens. Most of them in funny costumes or with slogans painted on signs,” Galloway said.

Countless signs, from serious to comical, displayed slogans like “fear everything” and “I like my tea party with sugar, not hate.”

“All of the signs were relatively humorous, clever or oftentimes both. None were especially politically motivated or malicious; mostly just sane,” Galloway said.

Stewart and Colbert, along with some accomplices, performed comedy skits for the crowd.

“Stephen Colbert stayed in character the whole time, which was expected. He and Stewart both had a lot of witty banter, ranging from jokes about Facebook to the mass media,” Galloway said.

Most of the rally was about entertainment and having fun. Ozzy Ozbourne, Sheryl Crow and Kid Rock performed. One of the more ridiculous skits involved a giant paper mache model of Stephen Colbert running around the stage and R2D2 from Star Wars handing out political advice.

Although the greater emphasis seemed to be on having fun, Stewart got serious with the crowd in his final speech. Discussing the toxicity of mass media and politics, he said, “If we amplify everything, we hear nothing.”

Stewart went on to thank everyone for attending the rally, saying they had wanted to avoid wasting anyone’s time at the rally.

“His final speech was really sincere. You could tell that he was genuinely amazed at the turnout of the rally and stressed the importance of the crowd coming together for sanity,” Galloway said.