January 29 is the birthday of Thomas Paine (1737-1809), the fiery rhetorician of America's revolution whose importance was such that John Adams said: "[W]ithout the pen of Paine, the sword of Washington would have been wielded in vain."

Common Sense, first published in January 1776, argued strongly for independence from England and was the most widely read pamphlet of the American Revolution, selling almost 500,000 copies to a population of 2.5 million. The first essay of The Crisis (with the famous opening line: "These are the times that try men's souls"), written by Paine at the front lines with Washington's army in 1776, was read aloud in every army camp. Its essays (from 1776-1883) were read by a larger fraction of the population than now watch the Super Bowl. And Paine did not make a penny from either, as the proceeds went to the revolutionary cause.