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The Eclectic Readers (commonly, but informally known as the McGuffey Readers) were a series of graded primers for grade levels 1–6. They were widely used as textbooks in American schools from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century, and are still used today in some private schools and homeschooling.

The editors of the Readers were brothers William Holmes McGuffey and Alexander Hamilton McGuffey. William created the first four readers and Alexander McGuffey created the fifth and sixth reader.^[1][2][3] About 120 million copies of McGuffey's Readers were sold between 1836 and 1960, placing its sales in a category with the Bible and Webster's Dictionary.^[4] Since 1961, they have continued to sell at a rate of some 30,000 copies a year.^[4] Only the Ray's Arithmetic series (1834–1913) matched it in popularity, written by a colleague of McGuffey's and begun in 1834.^[4]

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