An image of an antique metal marking stencil [circa late 1890s or early 1900s] reading “Folck’s Roller Mills #196 New Surprise manufactured by Wolfe Brothers, Cumberland, MD” had the words “New Surprise” rendered in a Western/Victorian typeface. Those letters served as the model for Old Trail JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

In 1962, the late Robert Libauer of the Stenso Lettering Company (of Baltimore, MD) revised two of his popular stencil lettering guides to offers users two choices: “traditional” stencil letters and numbers and "solid" letters for tracing and coloring. Solid Stencil JNL was modeled from one of those lettering guides, and contains all of the character anomalies found within that vintage stencil.

One of the text fonts showcased within the pages of the John Ryan Foundry (Baltimore, MD) specimen book from 1894 is a squared type face with rounded corners called “Geometric”. The original design has been updated slightly by substituting straight lines for the inner corner curves to add a small contemporary touch to a classic alphabet from the 19th century. Business Letter JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.