The above-the-store signage for many newspaper stands, soda shops, candy stores, luncheonettes and pharmacies of the 1950s and early 1960s were what was referred to as “privilege signs” provided by one of the major cola brands. Consisting of the brand’s emblems on the left and right, the remainder of the sign would carry the desired message of the storekeeper (such as “Candy – Soda – Newspapers”) in prismatic, embossed metal letters. Inspired by these vintage signs, Privilege Sign JNL recreates the condensed sans serif lettering style in both regular and oblique versions. The typefaces are solid black, but adding a selected color and a prismatic effect from your favorite graphics program can reproduce the look and feel of those old businesses.

The box cover of “Drawing Stencils No. 3 for Use on Slate or Paper” [a children’s drawing set produced by Montgomery, Ward & Company of Chicago circa the 1890s] had its title in an elegant spurred Roman type face. Working from the few letters available, a complete character set was created that resulted in Antique Packaging JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions. To note, this is the 1500th font release from Jeff Levine Fonts since its inception in January of 2006.

Up until the late 1920s, it was a popular habit in American songwriting to use African Americans as the topic of compositions using denigrating themes, words and even exaggerated character illustrations on the covers of the published sheet music. One such example of what was considered "entertainment" for its time was a piece entitled "Little Black Me". While this now socially and morally unacceptable piece of forgettable tripe is collected by some only for the historical documentation of the times they reflected, one good "positive" came out of this negative chapter of our country's musical heritage: The beautiful floral ornamented letters in the song's title has yielded Fancy Free JNL. Originally hand-lettered on an arc, these spurred Roman letters have been re-drawn, and are offered in both the regular design and a companion version with the ornamentation removed for lettering that is less ornate.

The hand lettered title on the sheet music for "Gee, But I'd Like to Make You Happy" (from the 1930 MGM motion picture "Good News") presented a conundrum. Some of the lettering was a classic Art Deco "thick and thin" design while the others resembled comic book title lettering. Leaning toward the comic book style, the conflicting letters were revised and the finished result became Funny Business JNL; available in both regular and oblique versions.

Antique brass stencils hand-cut for shipping items during the early part of the 20th Century were for sale in an online auction; and are the basis for Carton Stencil JNL.

The movie poster for the 1952 bank heist drama “Kansas City Confidential” had its title hand lettered in a condensed serif stencil design. This inspired Secret Operation JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Return Pass JNL is the solid version of Forward Passed JNL and can be used as a standalone font or in combination with Return Pass Fill JNL (the inline version with the main letters stripped away) for a dual color design. In some applications the inline fill may appear to create a cast shadow effect, so it may be necessary to manually adjust any overlaid copy.

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.

Morris Fuller Benton's Hobo [designed in 1910] is one of a number of fonts which have been so over-used that many designers shy away from it altogether. However, Jeff Levine had often wondered what the design might look like it given a serif treatment. The result is Rail Bum JNL, named for the hobos and transients who hitched along on freight cars to ride the rails across the country during the years when trains were the mainstay of American transportation.

Awkward Gothic JNL gets its name from the fact that it's a non-conformist alphabet - as if rendered by hand by a school child or an amateur lettering artist. Although there is a relative symmetry to most of the letter forms, some unconventional widths and the shape of many of its characters adds to the hand-made look of this alphabet.

Never let it be said that a good pun and a good font name can't work well together. The vintage sheet music for a 1920s-era song called "King Tut" (not to be confused with the novelty tune by comedian Steve Martin) presented an oddly-interesting block font which is now available in digital form as Type Uncommon JNL. The pun derives from the font's name of "Type Uncommon", which is similar in sound to King Tut's full name (which is Tutankhaten).

Evening Initials JNL are based on a few random examples of some unusual Art Deco initials found within the pages of an old Dover clip art book. A complete set of letters was redrawn from scratch and are offered for your creative endeavors as a digital type font.

Stencil Set JNL takes the 2011 release of Stencil Mark JNL (a spur-serif letter based on a vintage set of brass stencils) and transitions it to the design of a clean, bold sans typeface.

The unusual type design that comprises Cold Case JNL was modeled from a 1950s set of letter and number stencils manufactured by the Huntington Oil Cured Stencil Company of Huntington, NY (later relocating to South Florida).

The 1957 French publication “La Letra Dans La Peinture et la Publicite” (“The Letter tn the Painting and Advertising”) had an illustration of split-serif letters and numbers with a decidedly Western feel. This is now available as Horse Thief JNL in both regular and oblique versions.

Naroid Initials JNL is one of the most ultra-compressed sets of initials available in digital type. These twenty-six initials are so narrow that a test print with all of the letters at 2-1/2 inches in height took up no more than about 5 inches in width!

In 1999, Jeff Levine released a freeware font called "Channel Tuning JL" scanned from drawings made with a felt tip marker and designed as if the letters were breaking up due to poor reception such as on pre-digital TV sets. Over a decade later, Jeff has totally reworked the font—giving it cleaner lines, an extended character set and renaming it Channel Surfing JNL to set it apart from the roughly-drawn original.

The Dec., 1936 - Jan., 1937 edition of Radio Mirror offered up a condensed, hand lettered sans serif type design that - although an Art Deco style- is also somewhat futuristic in design. This is now available as Condensed Moderne JNL in both regular and oblique versions.

The inspiration for Deco Eccentrique JNL was initially hand drawn contoured lettering from a mid-1920s piece of sheet music; the style of the letters showing influences of the upcoming Art Deco movement. This was made into a digital font entitled Poster Contoured JNL. Once all of the excess parts of the previous design were stripped away to only the inner letters, the pre-Art Deco influences remained along with characters of varying stroke widths and shapes. This non-conformist type face is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The 1960 revised edition of Sam Welo’s “Studio Handbook – Letter and Design for Artists and Advertisers” showcases the many interesting lettering designs Welo hand lettered for his book. One such example is an extra-bold serif typeface which is now available as Law Office JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions. --------------

Sign Trade JNL is a reworking of Sign Crafter JNL. With a traditional M,N and W replacing the stylized versions of these letters in the previous font, Sign Trade JNL also offers an oblique version.

All Pro JNL is a sports font embellished with stars and stripes and is perfect for team banners, sportswear and sports-oriented ads. The font contains alphabet, numerals and the most basic of punctuation with very little kerning.

A few scant examples of some condensed Roman style water-applied decals inspired Sign Letters JNL. The decals were once part of the gold and black "Signmaker" letters and numbers once manufactured by the Duro Decal Company of Chicago and were sold through hardware and variety stores across the country. The condensed letters (which were eight inches in height) did not sell as well as Duro's mainstay sizes of 1/2 inch to 3-1/2 inches and were discontinued long before the rest of the line was supplanted by self-adhesive lettering.

It’s not often a vintage cartoon can inspire a type design, but such is the case when the name “Daffy Duck” is hand lettered on a mailbox in the 1946 Warner Brothers cartoon “The Great Piggy Bank Robbery” (famously being a send-up of the popular Dick Tracy comic strip by Chester Gould). Mail Route JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The hand lettering found throughout the movie trailer for 1942's "Mr. and Mrs. North" inspired Criminal Intent JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The simple song title "May I", found on the sheet music from the 1934 Bing Crosby-Carole Lombard film "We're Not Dressing" was hand lettered in a blocky, ultra-bold Art Deco design that foreshadowed the techno look of the 1970s and 1980s. This became the basis for Art Techno JNL.

Fincastle Sans JNL is an all-caps titling font in both regular and oblique versions. It's clean, legible monoline design complements any layout from ad copy to personal stationery.

There's nothing too fancy about Pool Deck JNL, which is based on an older typeface design. It's your basic sans serif condensed type style with a few unconventional letter shapes.

Sign Helpers JNL is a collection of silhouette images carefully redrawn from two distinct sources. Prior to their bankruptcy in 1984, the Holes-Webway Company of St. Cloud, MN produced thousands of their "Webway" sign kits that were utilized by merchants, libraries and schools throughout the country. At one point they included in their sales catalog a selection of die-cut images for embellishing sign work. In the late 50s and throughout the 60s, the Joseph Struhl Company (now known as Magic Master Industries) produced cling vinyl sign kits for business, and a home movie titling set for do-it-yourself film makers. This set also featured die-cut embellishments. A generous selection of designs from both kits have been faithfully re-drawn in digital form to pay tribute to two innovative companies. Other fonts based on products from these companies are Sign Kit JNL (Webway® Sign Kit), Cling Vinyl JNL, and Sign Maker JNL (Magic Master® Sign Kits). Trademarked names are used purely for reference purposes.

A German travel poster from 1927 became the design inspiration for a type revival because of its pleasantly hand lettered sans serif type style. Euro Travel JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

A lobby card for the 1929 movie musical “Broadway Melody” features the bulk of the film’s title hand lettered in a playful sans serif style. This design is now available as Movie Musical JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Eckhardt Trilinear JNL was inspired by [and modeled from] a pen-drawn alphabet found in a 1960 edition of the Speedball® lettering textbook. As with many other "sign painter-oriented" typefaces by Jeff Levine, it is named in honor of Jeff's good friend -- the late Albert Eckhardt, Jr. Al ran Allied Signs in Miami, Florida from 1959 until his passing.

A set of vintage lettering templates manufactured by Albert Nestler in Germany yielded this Art-Deco flavored typeface with many unusual letter forms. Lettering templates were used for decades by architects and draftsmen prior to other advanced lettering methods to label renderings, blueprints and layouts. Although they are similar to stencils in the fact that the lettering is traced, templates are designed to produce solid lettering with the use of a technical pen.

Examples of Australian brass stencils used for baling form the basis of Farming Stencil JNL. The hand-cut look of this typeface gives a more casual approach to a standard stencil design.

A 1940s-era package of "Herald Square" carbon paper sold by the F.W. Woolworth 5 & 10 cent stores offered up the hand lettered Art Deco design of Stationery Department JNL.

Ask any typical New Yorker about subway directions and they'll tell you to take the "uptown line", "downtown line" or "cross-town line". Uptown Line JNL is yet another variation of the Art Deco monoline style of lettering prevalent during the 1930s and 1940s, and is based on titling from vintage sheet music for a Johann Strauss classical piece.

An image spotted in an online auction online of a 1940 Milton Bradley child's activity set consisting of wooden letters formed the basis for School Activities JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions. Although the basic characters feature chamfered corners, the nature of bending the steel rule dies to form the letters to be cut from the wood provided rounded edges as well, creating their unique look.

Stencil Board JNL is another typeface modeled from lettering made by a Diagraph stencil cutting machine. Diagraph was first to make stencil punch machines which are used both industrially and by the military. Thanks to Neil Haynes for the samples he provided from the company's machine testing department.

Best Bet JNL is a hybrid approach in reinterpreting the classic display font Beton. Using examples of the condensed version found on old sheet music, redesigning a few additional characters and melding them with slightly condensed versions of numbers from the standard weight, Best Bet JNL offers an interesting new version to an old favorite.

Art Class JNL was re-created from the titling of a lettering booklet called "Drawlet Portfolio", published by the Esterbrook Pen Company in the 1930s. Drawlet pens were Esterbrook's answer to the popular Speedball lettering pens, and the booklet was an instructional manual on hand lettering with the pen nibs.