Why? After all, this list won't do you any good at all, since I don't print commercially.
Well, partly it's because even though these Notebooks are online, they're still just my Notebooks - and I need to keep notes about this or I forget.
It's also a bit of a tradition among printers to list the types they have. Before the days of computer typesetting (where everyone has a gazillion "fonts" on their computer - mostly bad, often pirated) the list of fonts available defined much of the capabilities, and even the character, of a press. Both commercial and noncommercial presses often went so far as to print their own Specimen Books illustrating all of the fonts they had, and the work they could do with them. (Recall, a "font" is a specific typeface at a specific body (point) size, for handset type composed of a finite number of individual pieces of type.)
I don't really have a very good collection of handset type. This doesn't matter, because I'm not a very good printer - more and better type would be wasted on me. I'm also concentrating on casting my own type. But, for what it's worth, here's what I have for handset composition:
The first four sets of fonts to be included here were each "firsts" for me: the first type I ever bought (Blanchard), the first type I ever bought new (Baskerville), the first type I ever printed with (Spartan), and the first type I ever helped to cast (Hadriano Stone Cut).
[TO DO: Proof these and scan the proofs.]
Typeface: Monotype Baskerville
Sizes: 12, 18
Condition: new
History: McGrew notes that (Lanston) Monotype Baskerville was cut in 1931 and based on the 1923 Monotype (UK) cutting. By way of contrast, Linotype's Baskerville was cut in 1926 and based on (but not idential to) the ATF/"Fry" Baskerville. When I get the first Linotype running, it'll be interesting to compare the two of them, as I have Baskerville mats.
This was the first type I purchased after acquiring the first round of Linotypes and presses, in 2008. I got it new, directly from M & H Type.
Typeface: Blanchard
Sizes: 24, 48, 60
Condition: worn
History: Cast by the Inland Type Foundry from 1900 {McGrew, pp 36-37}.
This was my first type. We bought it at an antique store in Toledo, Ohio, in 2006 or 2007 - well before I ever knew I'd have a shop full of Linotypes and presses.
Typeface: Hadriano Stone Cut
Sizes: 24
Condition: new
History: Cast by Skyline Type Foundry 2009.
Hadriano Stone Cut is Sol Hess' modification of Goudy's Hadriano.
I helped Sky Shipley of Skyline Type Foundry to cast 52 fonts of this at the 2009 combined APA Wayzgoose and Midwest & Great Northern Printers' Fair in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa. It was cast on a Thompson, from matrices electroformed by the late Andy Dunker.
I don't think I'll ever be able to print from this font. It's just too important to me as type itself.
Typeface: Spartan Heavy
Sizes: 60, uppercase only
Condition: worn, dinged
Typeface: Spartan Medium
Sizes: 36, 48
Condition: worn, dinged
History: ATF's copy of Bauer's Futura {McGrew, pp 36-37}. I need to verify that this is in fact Spartan, as opposed to Monotype Twentieth Century.
This was a gift from Rachel Scott, Duane Scott's daughter. She assume that it was so far gone that I could use it only for recasting, and so gave it to me as a sample of foundry typemetal. I, on the other hand, intend to print from it. I used it for my very first printing on 2009-10-22 (in 60 pt).
[fractions - acqired at an antique store in the early 2000s]
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All portions of this document not noted otherwise are Copyright © 2009 by David M. MacMillan and Rollande Krandall.
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