The Old Farmer’s Almanac for 2008: An Astronomical Review
by Charlie Cotterman

In this age of fastfastfasthurryupgetthelatestohthat’ssofivesecon dsago, when the whole world seems to rotate around Brangelina and Brit’n’Fed-ex and Paris and who’s running around with/doing what with/to who, it’s just so relaxing and refreshing to log off teh interwebs, kick back in a relaxing chair, and open up a good book. The feel of paper is so much more pleasant to the fingertips, and the brain almost is audibly emitting an “…ahhhhh…”. It’s a definite bonus when the book in question is actually interesting and entertaining.

Such a tome is the 2008 edition of The Old Farmer’s Almanac. Founded back in and published since 1792, it’s a reminder of the day when this nation was young, the nearest neighbor could be a full day’s wagon ride away, you may not see anyone other than your immediate family for weeks at a time, and the most current information available to you could be months if not years old. A source of information was needed that could stay current in support of industry (which until the early part of the last century was almost exclusively agricultural). In addition, helpful hints, useful information, and entertainment for the rural family was always a plus. Weather predictions, home life, medicine, food, people…all of these things were of interest even moreso back then because of the dearth of it.

Additionally, because there wasn’t a whole lot of spare cash in the family budget, the more information that could be crammed between two covers of one book, the better. The Old Farmer’s Almanac filled that need, and continues to in its 216th year of publication.

Just as something to read, The Old Farmer’s Almanac (referred to hereinafter as TOFA) covers numerous subjects. The 2008 edition has articles on Tastes and Trends (a little bit of everything), gardening (vegetable gardens are this year’s focus), smart shopping in your local Farmer’s Market, growing your own popcorn (!), flower gardens that specialize in scents, container gardening, farm family recipes (homemade cream of mushroom soup…oh, yum…), the weather (in detail for the various regions of the country…don’t ask how they prognosticate, they won’t tell – that secret is more closely guarded than the recipe for Coca-Cola®), fishing tips, how to efficiently wash your hands, Pennsylvania Dutch barn hex signs, cats, quirky contests (the International Rotten Sneaker
Contest, for one), an essay contest (for the 2009 Almanac, the subject is ‘My Worst Cooking Disaster’ – I am considering an entry), and more and more and more. Of course, they are all interspersed with advertisements for everything from power garden implements to natural beeswax candles to varied cures for what ails ya to choir robes to home weather stations to just about anything you can imagine.

TOFA’s focus, though, is the seasons, the skies, the stars, and their relationship to us here on Spaceship Earth. Its monthly calendar pages give each month two pages, detailing Sunrise/set times, day’s length, tide times, Moonrise/set, the Moon’s place in the Zodiac, religious feasts of the world’s major religions, civil holidays, historical events, “proverbs, poems, and adages”, lunar phases, lunar/planetary conjunctions, eclipses, and more. In other pages, there are instructions on calculating local twilight, details on the year’s major meteor showers, planetary risings/settings, an astronomical glossary that is impressively educational for even the beginner, and even some advice on the predictions of earthquakes.

It’s important to note that TOFA was founded back in the day when the economic center of the country was the New England East Coast. All the dates and times are referenced to Boston, and tidal predictions are referenced to Boston harbor’s Commonwealth Pier. There are extensive listings and tables to convert these phenomena to your locale…it’s always nice to know when the pull of the Moon may influence whether a glass of milk will spill in Omaha…

TOFA always has an astronomical article, and this year’s is one I must highly recommend. Written by Bob Berman, it’s entitled “Through The Looking Glass”, and concentrates on a half dozen of the most often asked questions by beginners – why you should ignore the power ratings on the box of department store telescopes, start small, and why binoculars are a good starter instrument (hallebalujah!!!). This is a marvelous quick reference article for beginners that will steer them down the straight and narrow, and not the garden path.

The Old Farmer’s Almanac for 2008 went on the rack on its traditional start-of-sale date of the second Tuesday in September (I got mine in the mailbox a few days earlier – yes, I have a multi-year subscription!). If you can’t find a copy locally, there is a website ( http://www.almanac.com ) that has more things available than a paperback book can offer (website links including The Astronomical League, some interactive star maps, and more). Of course, we’re concentrating on the print edition of TOFA, so we can actually go outside and see the stars without the burden of a laptop. There is a national edition, and specific editions for the South and the West (the only difference is the city where time/tide are calculated).

The Old Farmer’s Almanac is available by subscription (3 years for $24.95). Newsstand price is $5.99. There’s The Old Farmer’s Almanac for Kids (two volumes, $9.95 each). Concentrating as we are on its astronomical information, TOFA 2008 is a marvelous tool for the beginning stargazer who isn’t ready for reference books that go as deep as the RASC Observer’s Handbook (although for the experienced, TOFA makes an excellent companion to that volume).

The Old Farmer’s Almanac makes a worthwhile and interesting reference book for those of us who like to stand outside after dark and look up for hours at a time – and if it’s overcast, you can take it inside and read it on other subjects!

What other book do you know that comes with a pre-punched hole up in the corner so you can hang it on a nail where it’s handy?

(OBLIGATORY DISCLAIMER: the author has no connection to The Old Farmer’s Almanac, its parent company Yankee Publishing of Dublin NH, or its editorial or writing staff, other than that of a satisfied reader and customer. The author has neither asked for nor received any remuneration of any kind from Yankee Publishing. Yankee Publishing has been kind enough to supply copies of TOFA as youth prizes for an astronomical convention that the author is associated with, but the author has been a paid subscriber to and a reviewer of TOFA for a number of years before that relationship established itself, and nothing in that relationship should be read into the opinions expressed in this review, which are solely those of the author.)

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"If a tree is cut down in the rainforest, and is used to make paper to print a book, and the book is really bad, and there's nobody that will read it, do you still hear a sucking sound?"
Charlie in Dayton, A.AsC.

Great review, CiD! Thank you.

As you can see, I've been reading TOFA for a long time.



I need to compare their stance on astrology (they were contrary to it) back then to the current edition.

Some of the ads are fascinating. I might post a few. The articles and anecdotes are always worth a read.

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