1868 Leavitt's Farmer's Almanac Concord N.H. (USA)

Nice post-Civil War period Almanac.

Nice graphic on wrapper with farmer and plough team, wife looking on, farmhouse in background.

Nice graphic on front title page relating to Time, and farm-related engraved headers for each month.

Information includes:

• seat of state governments, date of elections, times of meeting of legislatures
• celestial phenomena, eclipses, etc.
• monthly calendars with sunrise and sunset, moon changes, high water, predicted weather, etc.
• courts (federal and New England states)
• Agriculture, farming &c.
• Rates of postage
• Valuable medical information
• Poetry and anecdotes
• …

Ads for House-Building Hardware (Concord), Lee & Shepard children’s books (Boston)...

48 pages + wrapper

Period writing on some pages ("commenced haying"...)

Fair condition. UR corner missing from front wrapper. Tears and creases on most pages. Missing back wrapper.

7 ¾" X 5"

Dudley Leavitt (1772 – 1851) was an American publisher. He was an early graduate of Phillips Exeter Academy in his native town of Exeter, New Hampshire, and later moved to Gilmanton where he first edited a newspaper and taught school. Within a few years, Leavitt relocated to Meredith, where in addition to teaching school and farming, he began publishing in 1797 Leavitt's Farmers Almanack, one of the nation's earliest farmers' almanacs. A polymath, Leavitt poured his knowledge of disparate fields including mathematics, language and astronomy into the wildly popular almanacs, which outlived their creator, being published until 1896.

But the almanac, which he dubbed Leavitt's Farmers' Almanack and Miscellaneous Yearbook, became such a success that after a while Leavitt shelved many of his other activities to focus on it. The once-farfetched idea was a runaway hit. By 1846, for instance, Leavitt's almanacs were selling some 60,000 copies for that year's two editions – a tremendous number for the era.

Leavitt aimed the almanacs at the general population of New England, supplying tips on everything from farming to the weather to astronomy. As word spread about the publication, readership jumped, and the publication became a fixture throughout the region. The almanacs were sold at general stores, and later at grocery stores and drug stores. Leavitt was aided in some of the almanac's calculations geared towards agriculture by his nephew, astronomer William B. Leavitt.

WIKIPEDIA