McGuffey’s Eclectic Second Reader McGuffey Readers are a series of graded primers for grade levels 1-6. The readers were among the first textbooks in America that were designed to become progressively more challenging with each volume. They were widely used from the mid-19th century to the early-20th century, and are still used in homeschooling today. 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. This edition is based off the 1879 Revised Edition of the McGuffey Readers. As always, this edition is complete and unabridged.