[US] Dard Hunter, Sr.

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1. Overview

William Joseph ("Dard") Hunter, Sr. (1883 - 1966). Primarily a papermaker, he cut by hand a face of his own design between 1912 and 1914. Cut in 18 point only, by hand punchcutting in steel. It was first used in 1915 and last used in 1932.

It is relatively difficult for the casual reader to discover exactly what face Dard Hunter Sr. made (as opposed, for instance, to digital faces in one way or another inspired by him). The essential references you need are:

The entry in {McGrew 1993} for this type is correct, but confusing. McGrew calls the type cut by Dard Hunter Sr. in 1912-1914 the "Mountain House Press Type" and the later type cut by Dard Hunter Jr. in 1936-1939 the "Mountain House Press Type II", without quite saying that Sr. cut the first and Jr. cut the second. I do not think that these names were used by either of the Hunters for either of these types. Both types were used by the Hunters' Mountain House Press, but as the first was cut (and used multiple times) before that Press was established this name for it is slightly anachronistic.

I have been unable to discover a public domain specimen of this type that I can reproduce here. It may be seen in use in The Etching of Figures and other works printed by Dard Hunter's press at Marlborough-on-Hudson, NY from 1915 through 1917 and Dard Hunter Sr. and Jr.'s Mountain House Press from 1920 through 1932. There are specimens in {McGrew 1993} (pp. 224-225, under "Mountain House Press Type"), in {Baker 1998} (Fig. 20 on Plate 13), and in {Hunter Jr. 1983} (p. 20).

2. Works Relating to Type-Making

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The Etching of Figures (1915)

Bradley, William Aspenwall and William Auerbach Levy (etching by). The Etching of Figures. (Marlborough-on-Hudson, NY: Dard Hunter, 1915.)

The content of this book is unrelated to type, but it was the first use in print of Dard Hunter's 1912-1914 type.

This book has been digitized by the J. Willard Marriott Library of the University of Utah and is available in their Dard Hunter collection, online at: http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm/ref/collection/DardHunter/id/3038. The icon here links to a local PDF assembled from this digitization.

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"Seventeenth-Century Type-Making" (1916)

Hunter, Dard [Sr.] "Seventeenth-Century Type-Making," The Quarterly Notebook, Vol. 1, No. 3 (October 1916): 49-54. (Kansas City [no state given, probably MO]: [no publisher], 1916.)

This is a very brief overview of punchcutting and typefounding, generally after Moxon, for a popular audience.

This journal has been digitized by Google from the State University of Iowa copy, Google ID: 4eFNAQAAMAAJ. The icon here links to a local copy of a PDF format extract of Hunter's article.

This article was also reprinted in A Dard Hunter Reader {Thompson 2000}: 65-71.

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The Mentor (1922)

Hunter, Dard [Sr.] "A Maker of One-Man Books." The Mentor, Vol. 10, No. 2 (March 1922): 30-31.

This is a nontechnical overview of Hunter's goals as a complete bookmaker No doubt through faulty editing, it conflates Hunter's studios in Marlborough-on-Hudson, NY, and Chillicothe, OH.

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Primitive Papermaking (1927), Extract

Hunter, Dard [Sr.] Primitive Papermaking. (Chillicothe, OH: Mountain House Press, 1947.)

This book has been digitized by the J. Willard Marriott Library of the University of Utah and is available in their Dard Hunter collection, online at: http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/DardHunter/id/1698. The icon here links to an extract of the page relating to type-making from the "Note Regarding the Type Employed in Printing this Book," from this Univ. of Utah digitization.

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Prospectus (for Indo-China, 1947)

Hunter, Dard [Sr.] Papermaking in Indo-China: Prospectus. Chillicothe, OH: Mountain House Press, 1947.

This is now a scarce item, the only available copies of which tend to be bound with Papermaking in Indo-China (an expensive item); I have not yet seen it.

In her chapter "The Typefaces of Dard Hunter, Senior and Junior" Cathleen Baker both cites and quotes from this Prospectus. I would appear to be her source for the statement that the Mountain House Press acquired "a Martin Torlsaas pivotal casting machine ... from the Hansen Company" in 1942. Baker also quotes directly:

"In 1942 the Mountain House Press acquired the tools, gauges, typecasters, and moulds used in making all sizes of type from nonpareil to six-line pica. During the past year these appliances have been put to use ... The present typefounding appliances are much more complete and provicient than the scant and primitive tools, now in the Smithsonian Institution, that were used in the making of my original handmade type." (quoted from Hunter in {Baker 1998}: 65-66)

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Life Work (Vol. 2, 1983)

Hunter, Dard, Jr. The Life Work of Dard Hunter. (Chillicothe, OH: Mountain House Press, 1983.)

The chapter "Typefounding, 1912-1914" (pp. 20-26) discusses and illustrates Dard Hunter Sr.'s type-making of the 1912-1915 period.

This book has been digitized by the J. Willard Marriott Library of the University of Utah and is available in their Dard Hunter collection, online at: http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm/ref/collection/DardHunter/id/2999. It is in copyright, and not reproduced here.

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Wright (1992)

Wright, Helena E. "Dard Hunter at the Smithsonian." Printing History, Vol. 14, No. 2, Whole No. 28 (1992): 3-13.

This article discusses the complicated history of Dard Hunter Sr.'s materials as donated to the Smithsonian (and sometimes reclaimed by him). It contains a small-scale reproduction of a photograph of a large display of type-making equipment (gravers, calipers, small files, punches, matrices, a hand mold, a ladle, and types) for a 1920s exhibition of this material.

3. References

{Baker 1998} Baker, Cathleen A. "The Typefaces of Dard Hunter, Senior and Junior." [chapter 4 in] David Pankow, ed. American Proprietary Typefaces. [no location]: American Printing History Association, 1998.

{Baker 2000} Baker, Cathleen A. By His Own Labor: The Biography of Dard Hunter. New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Press, 2000.

This is a reprint in one volume of the two-volume letterpress edition: (Northport, AL: Red Hydra Press [Steve Miller], 2000.)

{Bradley 1915} Bradley, William Aspenwall and William Auerbach Levy (etching by). The Etching of Figures. Marlborough-on-Hudson, NY: Dard Hunter, 1915.

Reprinted above.

{Hunter 1916} Hunter, Dard [Sr.] "Seventeenth-Century Type-Making," The Quarterly Notebook, Vol. 1, No. 3 (October 1916): 49-54. Kansas City [no state given, probably MO]: [no publisher], 1916.

Reprinted above.

{Hunter 1922} Hunter, Dard [Sr.] "A Maker of One-Man Books." The Mentor, Vol. 10, No. 2 (March 1922): 30-31.

Reprinted above.

{Hunter 1927} Hunter, Dard [Sr.] Primitive Papermaking. Chillicothe, Ohio: Mountain House Press, 1927.

Extract of page from the section "A Note Regarding the Type Employed in Printing this Book" reprinted above .

{Hunter 1947} Hunter, Dard [Sr.] Papermaking in Indo-China: Prospectus. Chillicothe, OH: Mountain House Press, 1947.

I have not yet read this. Extracts in {Baker 1998}: 65-66.

{Hunter Jr. 1983} Hunter, Dard, II. The Life Work of Dard Hunter, Vol. 2. Chillicothe, OH: Mountain House Press, 1983.

{McGrew 1993} McGrew, Mac. American Metal Typefaces of the Twentieth Century. New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Books, 1993.

{Thompson 2000} Thompson, Jack C., ed. A Dard Hunter Reader. Portland, OR: The Caber Press, div. of Thompson Conservation Laboratory, 2000.

This collection reprints {Hunter 1916}.

{Wright 1992} Wright, Helena E. "Dard Hunter at the Smithsonian." Printing History, Vol. 14, No. 2, Whole No. 28 (1992): 3-13.

This includes a checklist of Hunter's materials at the Smithsonian.

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