A successful almanac was a valuable source of income to a provincial printer. Andrew Bradford was printing four and Samuel Keimer one, when Franklin and Meredith opened the New Printing-Office in 1728. Entering this crowded, competitive field, the partners the next year issued Thomas Godfrey’s Pennsylvania Almanack for 1730; and in the fall of 1730 Franklin added to his line John Jerman’s American Almanack, formerly printed by Bradford. In 1732, however, both Godfrey and Jerman took their copy to Bradford, who now prepared to issue five almanacs for 1733, leaving Franklin with none. In these circumstances Franklin hastily compiled the first Poor Richard’s Almanack. It was advertised in the Gazette on December 19, 1732, as “just published.”6

Eighteenth-century almanacs followed a common pattern, and the new publication displayed originality in no essential feature—not even in its title, which was probably suggested by Poor Robin’s Almanack, which James Franklin printed at Newport; or in its title-page, which was hardly distinguishable from John Jerman’s. The very name of the imaginary compiler of his almanac Franklin borrowed from an actual astrologer and almanac-maker of seventeenth-century England. Richard Saunders was made to address his readers, as all good philomaths did; and sometimes their almanacs, like his, printed epigrammatic verses, proverbs, and aphorisms, occasionally even clever ones. The scope for originality and enterprise was strictly limited by convention and format, but what scope there was Franklin exploited fully.

In advertising his almanacs Franklin offered enticing previews of their contents. He attracted the attention of his competitors and the public with Swiftian hoaxes, predicting to the very hour and minute when his principal rival Titan Leeds would die, and assuring Jerman’s readers that the stars themselves foretold that their favorite philomath would rejoin the Church of Rome. He retained the public’s interest and won its support by printing a great number of verses, proverbs, and aphorisms, more pointed, humorous, and memorable than those in any other almanac.

Probably none of the verses was original with Franklin; he himself said that most of the proverbs and aphorisms were taken from the wisdom of all ages.7 But he rarely, if ever, took a line directly from its source, and he never borrowed from his competitors. His relied chiefly on English anthologies, notably James Howell, Lexicon Tetraglotton (London, 1660); Thomas Fuller, Gnomologia (London, 1732), Introductio ad Prudentiam (London, 1726–27), and Introductio ad Sapientiam (London, 1731); George Savile, Lord Halifax, A Character of King Charles the Second: and Political, Moral, and Miscellaneous Thoughts and Reflections (London, 1750); Samuel Richardson’s compilation of “Moral and Instructive Sentiments” as an appendix to Clarissa, 1750–51; and Charles Palmer, A Collection of Select Aphorisms and Maxims (London, 1748). Most of the verses at the heads of the months came from similar compilations, especially Sir John Mennes and James Smith, Wits Recreations (London, 1640); and the anonymous Collection of Epigrams (London, 1735–37). About two-thirds of the sayings and half of the verses have been traced to their sources in one or another of these anthologies. Quite as interesting, for the light it throws on Franklin’s methods of work, is his drawing on a particular source for a single year or for consecutive years. Thus Howell was his principal source from 1734 to 1742, and Fuller’s Gnomologia from 1745 to 1751.

But Richard Saunders was more than a compiler from compilations. He delighted his readers because of the way he carefully selected and skillfully revised the wise sayings and epigrams, eliminating superfluous words, smoothing and balancing awkward phrases, replacing vague and meaningless generalities with his own specific, sharp, and homely terms.8 In these line-fillers as in formal essays Franklin aimed to be short, clear, and smooth. The following examples illustrate the point:

Though neither the rarest nor typographically the most attractive products of Franklin’s press, Poor Richard’s Almanacks are probably the best known. They sold over 10,000 copies annually for many years, and the name, contents, and format were eagerly and shamelessly imitated and copied until well into the nineteenth century, in England as well as in America. Except the first and third printings of the 1733 almanac, only one copy of each of which is known, and a few other issues of which no more than three copies have been located, each year of Franklin’s authorship is represented by several surviving copies, though many of them are imperfect. Most large collections of Americana have several issues, but none has a complete run.9 Careful typographical studies of the almanacs will reveal not only the complicated printing history of Franklin’s best-seller but actual practices in his shop and, presumably, among American printers generally.1

The almanac for 1733 opened with an address to the reader. This was followed by an explanation of astrological signs, a page of calculations of the planets’ motions for the year, and an explanation of this particular almanac’s format. The months came next, one to a page, each headed by some verse, each with astronomical symbols, weather predictions, and aphorisms intermingled. The almanac ended with a predicttion of eclipses for the year, and the dates of courts, Quaker meetings, and fairs in Pennsylvania and neighboring colonies. A list of the kings of England at the front and one of reigning monarchs at the back, a table of distances, and some more verses composed the remainder of the pamphlet. From this and subsequent almanacs the editors will print Franklin’s addresses to the reader, the verses and aphorisms of each month, some of the explanations, descriptions, and miscellaneous verses; but not the annual calculations, court lists, and statistical information. A comparison of the illustrations of the complete 1733 almanac (pp. 287–310) with the material which follows in letterpress (pp. 311–8) will indicate clearly what parts of each year’s issue will be printed in this edition and how they appear in the original work.