Author: Riley Shannon

With a title like: An Almanack; Containing an Account of the Coeleslial Motions, Aspects, &e. For the year of the Christian Empire, 1691; a reader would expect to peruse the lunar cycles and weather predictions for 1691. This is the intended use for an almanac; a tool for farmers to help predict how crops would perform based on meteorological and astrological predictions for the year. However, the reader would be mistaken as this book is neither an almanac, in the traditional sense, nor from 1691. The present edition of An Almanack was printed in 1843, and the text is almost entirely The New England Primer, not an almanac. The New England Primer is a children’s textbook that was printed and used to promote literacy in America. This edition of An Almanack, apart from the front matter, is The New England Primer written by Benjamin Harris, who while not credited as the author of this book is included on the title page as the original publisher. This inclusion is intriguing as the primer was not added to the Henry Newman text until the second edition print in 1777 and again in the present edition from 1843.  

As if the almanac was not confusing enough in title and author, there is second title page in between the front matter and the primer text. The second title page more clearly identifies the book as The New England Primer printed in 1777. See Figure 1 It is difficult to assume as to why the editor (unknown) of the current edition would include the title page of the previous edition, but it is helpful to identify when and where certain aspects of the current edition were added to the Henry Newman text. 

The size of this book should also be stressed. The typical almanac is in quarto size; roughly 12 inches tall. This almanac however is only 4.5 inches tall. It can fit in the palm of one hand and is less than half an inch thick. Compared to a quarto this book is miniscule; another reason being named An Almanack is widely misleading (“Quarto”). 

The almanac has 46 leaves, none of which are numbered, and all show signs of foxing and staining. The pages are likely made of wood pulp as the switch to this material was made in the year prior to its publication and made a stronger paper (Valente). The publication year of the book also helps to determine the body font in this book which I have identified to be Bodoni (Penney). I determined this by researching what font type was widely used in the 19th century, I then used the app What the Font to confirm that the main font used in the book is Bodoni (WhatTheFont). The cover and binding unfortunately share in the signs of aging as the pages. See Figure 2 The book is bound with a cotton ribbon that from repeated use has been exposed on the inside of the book. The blue color from the front and back cover is flaking off from the cardboard, and the book is very delicate because of this.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The front matter of this book is dense as it spans over 4 leaves. The front matter contains a note from the publisher of the present edition, two advertisements, an introduction to the present edition, certificates, a song and a portrait. The publisher, Ira Webster, notes that all the known information about the origin of The New England Primer is included in one of the advertisements as a part of the front matter. See Figure 3 Webster also notes that the information was copied from a book in the Massachusetts Historical Society’s Library. This publisher’s note and the advertisement mentioned are both printed on the original title page. The advertisement is for The New England Primer enlarged and similarly to this book would have been printed with the inclusion of other writings.  

The second advertisement is atypical as it is not an advertisement for another writing but rather a society of women from Boston who vouch for reading the primer. It is also worth mentioning that the editor left a note that this advertisement was from a member of the society and the documents she had access to.  See Figure 4 

The introduction to the present edition narrates the story of the Westminster Assembly of Divines and how this led to the Puritan arrival in America with the Shorter Catechism. See Figure 5 The Westminster Assembly of Divines was held by the English long parliament with the intention of reforming the Church of England. From the gathering the Shorter Catechism was written, that is, questions and answers that help to teach the values of the protestant religion (“The Westminster Shorter Catechism”). The introduction stresses the importance of the catechism to the Puritans, and then questions why these teachings should not continue now, as in 1843, since they are the “richest treasure that ever human wisdom and industry accumulated” (Newman). 

The introduction page also indicates where, when, and how the present edition was printed, and the price at four dollars. See Figure 5 The book was published and sold by Ira Webster in Hartford, Connecticut and was printed by R. H. Hobbs using the stereotyping method. The stereotyping method used durable metal plates, which printed faster and would last longer than other printing methods at the time. The stereotyping method also created exact copies of text on each sheet, the term stereotyping developed from this process (“Stereotyping Printing”). 

The certificates in the front matter can be best qualified as endorsements that are found in modern books. I included a comparison of a certificate from An Almanack and those from a modern book. See Figure 6 The certificates are quoted material from contemporary writers or experts on the subject of the catechism. There is a note from the editor that these were included to add to the validity of the book, and for people likely to have known the authors, they would stress the gravity of the teachings.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After the certificates in the front matter is A Song on Praise. A Song on Praise is a hymnal which reads: 

How glorious is our heav’nly King 

Who reigns above the sky! 

How shall a child presume to sing, 

His dreadful Majesty? 

How great his Pow’r is, none can tell, 

Nor think how large his Grace;  

Not Men below, nor Saints that dwell 

On high before his Face. 

Not angels that stand round the LORD, 

Can search his secret will;  

But they perform his heav’nly word, 

And sing his Praises still. 

Then let me join this holy train, 

And my first off’rings bring; 

Th’eternal GOD will not disdain 

To hear an infant sing. 

My Heart resolves, my tongue obeys, 

And angels shall rejoice, 

To hear their mighty maker’s praise 

Sound from a feeble voice.  

The song was written by Dr. Issac Watts who was known for his writing of hymnals especially in language that children would have been able to decipher (Watts).  

Finally, the portrait incorporated in the front matter is captioned, “The Honorable John Hancock, esq; President of the American Congress.” The portrait is a beautiful seal of John Hancock in side profile and is drawn in a contour line style of portraiture. See Figure 7 Around the portrait are embellishments that resemble roses, and there is a noticeable absence of ink in parts of the picture. John Hancock was from Massachusetts, as was the almanac, which could be the reason for his presence in this book. It is however interesting that he would be pictured in a deeply Protestant book as he was an open advocate for Christianity (Smith).  

Apart from the front matter, this book has user marks on the inside cover. From the handwriting left behind, I was able to identify a former owner of An Almanack to be Alice B. French and her sister Hatty French. Alice also left the city of Bedford, New Hampshire in her inscription. In another post, I will outline further who Alice B. French is and how her life contributes to our knowledge about how this book was read. It is incredibly lucky to have this information left behind in the book for deciphering the life of the book. See Figure 8 

 

 

Works Cited 

“Book Descriptions: Glossary of Terms.” Book Addiction, bookaddictionuk.wordpress.com/book-collecting/book-descriptions-glossary-of-terms/. Accessed 7 Oct. 2024. 

Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopedia. “Westminster Assembly.” Encyclopedia Britannica, 24 Jun. 2024, https://www.britannica.com/event/Westminster-Assembly. Accessed 9 October 2024. 

“The New-England Primer Enlarged. For the More Easy Attaining the True Reading of English. To Which is Added, the Assembly of Divines Catechism.” New York Public Library, www.nypl.org/events/exhibitions/galleries/childhood/item/4109. Accessed 7 Oct. 2024. 

Newman, H. (1843). An almanack containing an account of the Coelestial Motions, Aspects, &c. For the year of the Christian Empire, 1691. Ira Webster. 

Penney, Margaret. “Type in History: The Didones.” Sessions College, 26 Nov. 2016, www.sessions.edu/notes-on-design/type-in-history-the-didones/. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024. 

“Quarto.” ABAA Glossary of Terms. The Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America, www.abaa.org/glossary/entry/quarto. Accessed 10 Oct. 2024. 

Smith, Gary Scott, ‘John Hancock: Congregationalist Revolutionary’, in Mark David Hall, and Daniel L. Dreisbach (eds), Faith and the Founders of the American Republic (New York, 2014; online edn, Oxford Academic, 16 Apr. 2014), https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199843336.003.0011, accessed 9 Oct. 2024. 

“Stereotyping Printing.” Indiana State Library, 6 June 2016, blog.library.in.gov/stereotyping-printing/. Accessed 24 Sept. 2024. 

Valente, A. J. “Changes in Print Paper During the 19th Century.” Purdue E-Pubs, docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1124&context=charleston#:~:text=Seems%20that%20somewhere%20along%20the,%2C%20manila%2C%20and%20wood%20pulp. Accessed 7 Oct. 2024.

Watts, Isaac. “SONG I. A general Song of Praise to GOD.” Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive, 04 Jul 2024 (v1.11 (Summer 2024)). Web. 10 Oct 2024. https://www.eighteenthcenturypoetry.org/works/o5454-w0010.shtml 

Werner, Sarah. Studying Early Printed Books, 1450-1800: a Practical Guide. Wiley Blackwell, 2019. 

The Westminster Shorter Catechism. 1648. 

WhatTheFont. Version 2.4, MyFonts Inc. WhatTheFont.