Lore and Legends about the Hagerstown Almanack--Saturday, November 16

Mountain City Traditional Arts to host, “Lore and Legends about the Hagerstown Almanack”

Prognosticator Bill O’Toole will give the talk, “Lore and Legends about the Hagerstown Almanack,” on Saturday, November 16 at 2 pm at Mountain City Traditional Arts in Frostburg. A Washington County native, O’Toole has been the Prognosticator for the Hagers-Town Town and Country Almanack since 1969. He has also written for two other almanacs, one for the entire continental USA and the other for Quebec Province in Canada. He’ll share highlights of the fabled almanac’s prestigious history and discuss its predictions, and share some intriguing regional weather-lore. 

John Gruber’s name still appears on the cover of his best-known publication, The Hagers-Town Town and Country Almanack that first made its appearance in the Hagerstown, Maryland area in 1797. It is the second oldest almanac in the United States and in fact, the oldest almanac that is still published today by heirs of its founder. 

Gruber’s Hagerstown Almanack has been a mainstay tradition in the Mid-Atlantic Region for well over two centuries, providing farmers with seasonal weather forecasts as well as critically important astronomical information considered to be vital to agricultural success in the region. This regional publication has been an important resource for many folks for more than 200 years. It is also one of the most talked about almanacs around the world providing some of the most accurate weather predictions available, as well as health, home and gardening tips. There are even predictions of the gender of unborn children. 

With a strong background in mathematics, (he spent 41 years teaching Math and Computer Science at Mount Saint Mary’s College), and long-time interest in astrophysics, O’Toole’s work reveals that prognosticating can be a complex  endeavor.The Almanack has always relied on individuals who used traditional methods of the day when calculating and conjecturing the weather. Each has used basically the same fundamentals and information with an amazing degree of accuracy, which is all the more astounding when it is considered that their predictions were done over a year in advance. There have been a total of seven Calculators over the past 215 years. O’Toole attributes his uncanny accuracy to a combination of elements that include using specialized software and computer power to precisely calculate phases of the Moon, close analysis of sunspot activity, and the tracking and noting of El Nino/La Nina cycles. His methods have produced impressive results year after year, outscoring Old Farmer’s, Almanac and even the National Weather Service. 

This is part of a series of presentations hosted by FSU students enrolled in "Folklore in Appalachia" as part of their participation in the Appalachian Regional Commission's Appalachian Teaching Project.