Weekly expositor. (Brockway Centre, Mich.) 1882-1894, 1885-09-17
THE ALMANAC.
How the Advertising Medicines Are Made
The Largest Almanac In the United States.


Every family in the United States,
writes correspondent to The Cteve-
land Leader, uses an almanac, but few
people are cognizant of the immense
amount of work require | IN their pre-
paration. The phases of the moon,
the positions which the sun and stars
will hold at given times for every day
throughout the year. the calculation of
eclipses, and the hundred and one
other facts told by astronomy and
mathematics appear as regularly as
the years 90 round. The simplest al
manacs used for druggists advertise
ments are full of such information,
and when one goes further and picks
up one of the big volumes called nauti-
cal almanacs, published for the use of
astronomers and navigators, the array
OF figures is really appalling, and their
long lines Of digits, thrown into order
which would delight a Gradgrind,
make the brains of the general reader
swim as he endeavors to understand
them. These big nautical almanacs
are the fathers of all the others. The
calculations OF the smaller almanacs
are taken from them, and they feed,
as it were, the whole. family of little
almanacs the world over. The great
est nations of the world now have
their own nautical almanacs, and
these are made by Their respective
governments. The nautical almanac
of France has been published longer
than any o6ler, its editions having
been issued for several hundred years.
The British almanac comes next, dat
ing back to little before the Revolu-
ton, and the German and Spanish
were begun since then. The Ameri-
can nautical almanac was first issued
in 1855. and it is now said to be the
best almanac published anywhere in
the world. 1t contains more valuable
information and calculation than any
of the other government almenacs,
and it holds the highest place among
astronomers and navigators. The
almanac is made at Washington, and
a special department of the navy I'M
der Prof. Newcomb is devoted to its
getting up. 1t is book of solid fig
ures. over an inch thick, about eight
inches wide, and twelve inches long.
1t contains more than five hundred
pages, and each page is black with
multitude of carefully arranged fig
ures, each OF which represent hours of
calculation and sheets of scientific and
algebraic study.
The work is published three or more
years in advance of its date. The al
manac for 1888 is now out, and that
for 1889 is being prepared. Twelve
scientists, each noted as an astronomer
and mathematician, located in diff
ferent parts of the country, are almost
constantly working upon 1T. They
make their calculations and send them
to Washington, and they are here
proved before gong into the Almanac.
The title of the book is "The Ameri-
can Ephemeris and Nautical Altman
&C" and if you would abbreviate this
title in talking of it to one of the
makers of it he would be highly dis
gustcd. One of them told me yester-
day what it contained. but his words
of scientific terms fell upon my ear
like the jargon of Choctaw. and he
night MS well have expressed himself
in Greek. Some of the more scientific
of your readers, however, may under
stand him. i will repeat his answer
TO my request to know what this book
of five hundred pages of solid figures
contained. Ho said its calculations
are divided into three parts. Part l
is adapted to the meridian of Green
witch. 1t contains the positions of the
sun, moon, and primary planets for
every mean moon throughout the year.
1t contains the distances of the moon
l.a x1 tai, In 70
This is used by Davigators at sea for
determining the longitude, ETC., etc.
Part 2 Is adapted to the meridian OF
Washington, and is intended for the
use of astronomers, rs well as navIga-
tors 1t contains data for finding the
apparent positions of the fixed stars,
and gives also the apparent places of
the principal fixed stars for every tenth
upper transit at Washington; also the
suns apparent right ascension and de-
clination, hourly motion, and equation
of time for every mean and apparent
noon at Washington, and likewise the
same circumstances for the moon. 1t
also contains the mean time of transit,
right ascension and declination, hori-
zontal parallax and semi-diameter OF
transit at Washington. Part 3 is de-
voted to phenomenal and here, as
am not scientific dictionary on legs,
/ will not attempt to repeat what the
astronomer said it contained. 1t was
much worse than the above, and when
| looked again at the millions of figures
as he repeated the scientific iargon
became more and more impressed with
the immense work. of getting up a
nautical almanac and an american
Ephemeris.
These nautical almanacs, however,
do not deal with the weather. That
is left entirely to the weather bureau,
which is distinct from them. Altman
acs were made for years before any
government took them up. The old
Romans had sort of almanac, but
the first printed almanac was that of
George Won ,Burback, who issued his
predictions at Vienna in 1850. In the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries
almanacs were used as political docu-
ments, and they were full of astrology,
astronomy, and superstition in addi-
ton to their politics. The first Ameri-
can almanac was that of William Brad
ford, who published one in 1857. Ben
Franklin's "Poor Richards Almanac"
was first published in 1882, and the
American Almanac, which continued
its publication up to 1861, was first
published i'm 1923. There are now
about one hundred almanacs published