“A Nation Written in the Sky: How Almanacs, Eclipses, and Full Moons Mark America’s 250th Year”

An investigation into the way we record time, and what that says about who we are.

On the cusp of America’s 250th anniversary, there’s something almost poetic about pausing to look up. Not just at politics or economy or cultural churn — but at the sky itself. In 2026, the heavens are offering up a cosmic itinerary: full moons, total eclipses, annular eclipses, and more. And if you want the calendar straight, there’s still one perennial source that charts it all — even as traditional publications flail in the digital age.

One of those sources, the Maine-based Farmers’ Almanac, announced its final 2026 print edition (ending centuries of continuous publishing), underscoring a broader truth: how we record time and meaning is changing. Meanwhile, its older cousin, the New Hampshire–based Old Farmer’s Almanac, continues into our quarter-millennium celebration. The almanac tradition itself—born in early New England and enduring through revolutions, civil wars, and satellites—is a uniquely American story of keeping cosmic and civil time in the same ledger.

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A Skyward Calendar for 2026

For those who still yearn to mark life by the heavens, 2026’s celestial schedule reads like a poetic playlist:

🌕 Full Moon Names & Dates 

• Feb 1 – Snow Moon

• Mar 3 – Worm Moon

• Apr 1 – Pink Moon

• May 1 – Flower Moon

• May 31 – Blue Moon

• Jun 29 – Strawberry Moon

• Jul 29 – Buck Moon

• Aug 28 – Sturgeon Moon

• Sep 26 – Harvest Moon

• Oct 26 – Hunter’s Moon

• Nov 24 – Beaver Moon

• Dec 23 – Cold Moon

These names aren’t astrology—they’re agricultural lore, handed down from Native American and colonial calendars that helped settlers and farmers plan a year by the sky’s rhythms. They tell you when the sap runs and the insects wake. They tell you when the frost might bite and when to plant. Time as lived, not just tracked. 

Now layer onto that seasonal canvas the rare and dramatic eclipses that 2026 has in store.

🌑 Eclipse Season: Shadows Across the Earth

According to astronomical records compiled by NASA and eclipse trackers, 2026 will feature four major eclipses — two solar, two lunar:

🔥 Solar Eclipses

• Feb 17, 2026 — Annular Solar Eclipse (the ring of fire) — where the Moon doesn’t fully cover the Sun, leaving a fiery ring, visible in parts of Antarctica and as partial elsewhere. Wikipedia

• Aug 12, 2026 — Total Solar Eclipse — a narrow path of totality crossing Greenland, Iceland, northern Spain and beyond. Wikipedia

🌒 Lunar Eclipses

• Mar 3, 2026 — Total Lunar Eclipse — the classic “blood moon,” when Earth’s shadow turns the full moon a deep red. Best views in Western North America and across Asia and Oceania. Wikipedia+1

• Aug 28, 2026 — Partial Lunar Eclipse — deep shadow covering most of the Moon, still a dramatic sight for skywatchers. Wikipedia

(NASA and astronomical records agree on these dates and the types of each eclipse.) Time and Date

Notable celestial events in 2026 include a total lunar eclipse on March 3 during the Worm Moon, which will be a "blood moon" visible in parts of the western North America, Australia, New Zealand, East Asia, and the Pacific. A total solar eclipse will occur on August 12, viewable from areas like eastern Greenland, Iceland, and northern Spain, with a partial eclipse seen more widely. Additionally, the full moons in January, November, and December will be supermoons, appearing larger and brighter as they coincide with the moon being close to Earth. The Christmas Eve supermoon is anticipated to be the brightest of the year.

Why the Sky Still Matters

These eclipses are more than pretty spectacles. For millennia, human cultures have mapped meaning onto sky events—myths, calendars, prophecies, planting cycles. America’s almanac tradition began in 17th-century New England, where keeping a book of sun and moon wasn’t quaint — it was practical. The earliest New England almanac appeared in 1639, just years after the first printing press in the colonies. Almanacs told settlers:

“When to plant; when to harvest; when the eclipses and equinoxes fall; and how to tether your days to the rhythms above.” (wiki)

Unlike today’s algorithmic feeds, almanacs let you participate in time. They blurred science and wisdom, astronomy and agriculture, text and lived life — a record-keeping that made sense of the seasons and the state of the nation alike.

Now look at us: in a world of endless digital churn, we scroll calendars on screens that forget birthdays but remember ads — while the sky still keeps its ancient beat.

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A Nation at 250: Once More, With Wonder

As America reaches its 250th anniversary, there’s an unexpected parallel: the same curiosity that led colonists to bind celestial tables into paper pages is alive in backyard astronomers and eclipse chasers alike. We have:

• telescopes more powerful than early observatories

• spacecraft on trajectories early astronomers could only dream of

• phones that can track eclipses anywhere on Earth

— yet we still find ourselves wanting to look up for meaning, not just data.

1639 — The First Almanac in America

The second printed work in the English colonies appears in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Not a sermon. Not a law. A calendar of the sky.

America begins by recording time.

1792 — The Old Farmer’s Almanac

Founded in New England, where knowing when winter ends is not philosophical — it’s survival.

The republic is young. The seasons are not.

1818 — The Farmers’ Almanac

A rival publication appears, regionally focused, pragmatic, and wildly popular. Almanacs are no longer rare — they’re everywhere.

America industrializes. Almanacs keep the human scale.

1991 — Monte Albán, Oaxaca

Total Solar Eclipse — July
At the ruins of Monte Albán, stone and sky align. Totality passes over Oaxaca, Chiapas, and the Yucatán.

A campesino in Pavones Costa Rica is mortally wounded by the caretaker. In retaliation, gringo properties are burned. A war with squatters begins — a quiet prelude near Punta Salea, Costa Rica.

History doesn’t pause for eclipses.
It records them anyway.

2017 — Oregon, United States

Total Solar Eclipse — August
The path of totality cuts across the American West.

Traveling from Costa Rica to Oregon, hitchhiking the U.S. West Coast, the eclipse is witnessed from the shadow’s center. Millions watch. Cameras roll. Streams spike.

It becomes the most viewed eclipse in history.

A nation looks up together — briefly.

2024 — Central Texas

Total Solar Eclipse — April
Family, friends, and the eclipse gang gather under a darkening sky in Central Texas.

Phones are quieter now. People know to stop recording before totality hits. The moment makes the reports. The shadow does what it always does: silences the room.

This time, the memory matters more than the footage.

2026 — The Last Print Year

After more than two centuries, the Maine-based Farmers’ Almanac (Not to be confused with Old Farmer's Almanac.) publishes its final edition.

The sky remains. The paper stops.

America Turns 250

A quarter-millennium experiment in self-government pauses — or doesn’t — depending on who’s counting.

We still measure our lives by moons.

The almanac tradition may be shifting — the last Farmers’ Almanac print edition in 2026 — but the impulse behind it remains. We still want stories that tie our daily lives to time’s deeper patterns: the pull of the moon, the dance of shadows during an eclipse, the calendar of full moons that inspire farmers, poets, and dreamers alike.

Maybe that’s why we’ll still mark these events not just in apps, but on notebooks, on calendars, in conversations: because looking at the sky reminds us how far we’ve come — and how much we still share with the people who looked up before us.