Besides travelling and employing lecturers, to make the advantages of lightning conductors known, Franklin found means of doing so in an annual publication he had started in the year 1732, known as ‘Poor Richard.’ This almanac, humorous in form but very serious in substance, which had acquired an enormous circulation, proved in the end the most powerful instrument for spreading information on the great subject dear, above all others, to Franklin’s heart, and leading his countrymen to adopt, before all other nations, the wonderful metal rod, protective against ‘the wrath of heaven.’ In several of the editions of the almanac, notably the ‘Poor Richard’ for the year 1758, Franklin drew attention to his lightning conductors in simple advertisements, drawn up in a spirit of absolutely touching modesty and self-abnegation. Not seeking the slightest reward for himself, nor even mentioning his name, he only sought to benefit others by instructing them how to get protection against the dangers of lightning. ‘It has pleased God,’ ran the advertisement in the almanac, ‘in His goodness to mankind, at length to discover to them the means of securing their habitations and other buildings from mischief by thunder and lightning. The method is this:--Provide a small iron rod, which may be made of the rod-iron used by nailers, but of such a length that, one end being three or four feet in the moist ground, the other may be six or eight feet above the highest part of the building. To the upper end of the rod fasten about a foot of brass wire, the size of a common knitting-needle, sharpened to a fine point; the rod may be secured on the house by a few small staples. If the house or barn be long, there may be a rod and point at each end, and a middling wire along the ridge from one to the other. A house thus furnished will not be damaged by lightning, it being attracted by the points and passing through the metal into the ground without hurting anything. Vessels also, having a sharp-pointed rod fixed on the top of their masts, with a wire from the foot of the rod reaching down round one of the shrouds to the water, will not be hurt by lightning.’ Franklin had occasion subsequently greatly to modify the advice here given. He early discovered his error of lightning being ‘attracted by the points;’ and also found that his recommendation to people to construct their own lightning conductors only led to grievous calamities. There came reports from all sides of houses having been severely damaged by lightning notwithstanding having conductors, and close investigation soon showed that in every instance the apparatus was defective, having been erected by unskilful hands, either the owners themselves, or a set of wandering impostors, who soon made themselves notorious as ‘lightning-rod men.’