Here’s another gem by Ross F. George from the Speedball Text Book. It was originally entitled simply Bold Display (Modern Alphabets on Parade) and had a graduated spatter pattern. This version omits the pattern, but keeps the bold, brassy lines. Use it whenever you need an unusual and dynamic headline with a strong retro vibe. Both versions include the complete Unicode Latin 1252, Central European 1250 and Turkish 1254 character sets, with localization for Moldovan and Romanian.

The new Linotype® Devanagari typeface is a traditional text face now available in five weights (from Light to Black) and suitable for a wide variety of print and digital uses. A compact design, Linotype Devanagari also provides economy of space where textual real estate is at a premium. In addition, its large character set enables the setting of Hindi, Marathi, Nepali and is suitable for Sanskrit passages. The design’s open counters ensure high levels of legibility at small sizes and at modest resolution. The history of Linotype Devanagari is quite extensive. Inspired by the late 19th and early 20th century Nirnaya Sagar designs, it was originally designed in 1977 by Mathew Carter for phototypesetting systems. It was then revised and expanded for digital typesetting by the Linotype letter-drawing studio headed by Georgie Surman under the art direction of Fiona Ross. This new, enhanced revival was designed by Lisa Timpi and Gunnar Vilhjálmsson with Fiona Ross as a consultant. This new Linotype Devanagari is part of a project to refresh the pivotal Linotype Bengali and Linotype Gujarati typefaces and make them available for the first time in the popular OpenType font format.

Dave West’s Italiano is a smooth and sensuous typographic dish with a few extra savory dashes. The silky semi-serif combines ingredients from eighteenth-century engraved italics and nineteenth-century Italian Modern, softened by fine stroke endings and plump dolloped terminals. Preserve Italiano’s subtle flavors by maximizing its size in headlines, advertising captions, and identity campaigns, or capitalize on its swash characters to sweeten package and poster designs. However you use it, Plinc Italiano is a tasty typographic treat—non ci piove! Drawn in the late 1960s for Photo-Lettering, Inc., Italiano was digitized by Steve Ross with Ken Barber in 2015. Like all good subversives, House Industries hides in plain sight while amplifying the look, feel and style of the world’s most interesting brands, products and people. Based in Delaware, visually influencing the world.

An indomitable woman who traveled a lot, Emily Austin (Bryan) Perry was one of the children of Moses Austin, of Austinville, Virginia. Like her famous brother, Stephen F. Austin, she settled in Texas as one of that region's earliest colonists. While traveling about seeking treatment for a sickly daughter, she wrote many letters home -- letters that show a distinctively compact, legible hand. The challenge for me in designing the face: resisting the temptation to read and re-read her bossy directives and urgent appeals, all packed tightly together on a page. Emily Austin has a complete character set, and then some.

A 1918 lettering instruction book by William Hugh Gordon presented a number of lettering styles that were geared toward sign and show card painters along with tips and tricks regarding the correct construction of such signs for maximum effect. One pen lettered Roman alphabet with a beautiful set of numerals has been recreated digitally as Pen Elegant JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions. To note, Gordon was the co-inventor of the Speedball lettering pen with Ross F. George in 1915.

By the time that the 13th edition of the Speedball Text Book appeared in 1938, silent movies were a thing of the past; nonetheless, intrepid author Ross F. George included this typeface, originally intended for title cards, in the volume. Elegant and inviting, the occasionally quirky letterforms feature subtle diamond-shaped accents that add just the right touch of sparkle. The PC Postscript, Truetype and Opentype versions contain the complete Latin language character set (Unicode 1252) plus Central European (Unicode 1250) languages as well.

Here's another gem from perennial Speedball penmaster Ross F. George, originally called Split Caps. George's original design has been enhanced with the addition of lowercase characters, borrowed from another of his alphabets, and adapted to the style of the caps. This font derives its name from one of the catchphrases of the estimable Stooge-in-Chief, whose signature hairdo can be found in place of the Section mark. Both versions of the font include complete Latin 1252, Central European 1250 and Turkish 1524 character sets, with localization for Moldovan, Romanian and Turkish.