The Needle Makes a Fine Point for Printing

The Needle is an odd name for a periodical on the printing arts, but the publishers evidently had a really good point to make, as their subtitle suggests. This monthly print journal began as an advertising medium for Young & McCallister, one of the largest print and advertising firms in Los Angeles in the early 20th century. The Needle's first issue was published 100 years ago, in April, 1914 and continued its run for another 12 years. This nearly complete set of 15 bound leather volumes of The Needle once belonged to the editor and publisher, Bruce McCallister and just sold at auction. The journal was heavily illustrated and included typographic examples, pochoir and stencil colored plates, and tipped-in samples of their fine press work. 

Bruce McCallister (1881-1945) was a letterpress tramp printer who came out to California from South Dakota to find work. He arrived in San Francisco in 1906 on the day of the Great San Francisco Earthquake, and soon after made his way to Los Angeles where he found work at Senegram Printers. In 1912, he formed a partnership with letterpress printer, Frederick Young who emigrated to the states from England. Their timing dovetailed nicely with the Los Angeles real estate boom and by 1919, they dominated the advertising field with many colorfully printed promotional materials. McCallister was a fine pressman, salesman and innovator. He launched an in-house bindery and a separate screen printing department to meet the demands for colorful sign and poster printing. 

Image via sign industry

In 1927 McCallister hired a young typographer and book designer, Grant Dahlstrom and pursued the printing of fine press books. Their first book together, The History of Warner's Ranch and Its Environs was chosen as one of AIGAs 50 best-designed books of 1927. A second AIGA award was received for the design and printing of California Hills and Other Wood Engravings by Paul Landacre in 1931.

Image via Bonhams

Although Young & McCallister achieved great success in the printing field, they did not survive the Depression. In later years, Bruce McCallister continued to find success in the printing of books for The Huntington Library, Los Angeles bookman Jake Zeitlin, and his friend, Grant Dahlstrom who went on to acquire The Castle Press in Pasadena. Through his associations and mentoring of young printers such as Dahlstrom and Ward Ritchie, he set the stage for Los Angeles to become the West Coast center of fine press printing and publishing for a good part of the 20th century.

Blackletter in Fall Colors

Letterology is on Fall break again this week as I am preparing for the opening of the Camp Stories, Illustrated exhibit at the University of Puget Sound Collins Library in Tacoma, this coming Saturday. Instead, I bring you re-runs of some of my favorites from the Letterology attic. Thanks for your patience!

I'm so behind the times, this post is now two years old. It could have been last week, as it is still just as relevant. This cover was originally published for the Fall 2011 issue of T Magazine, a supplement of the Sunday New York Times. Los Angeles landscape designer, Judy Kameon and photographer Erik Otsea created this living Autumnal blackletter T, and I couldn't help but notice how much it resembles an elder gothic cousin; the rustic old growth T below. I've included a family snapshot of other extended members of this woodsy gothic alphabet whose roots go way, way back. ;^)

:: Rustic Old Growth Gothic Alphabet via the Letterology Archives.

Design Never Takes a Holiday

It was on Labor Day, September 2nd, 1957, fifty-six years ago today, George Giusti's celebrated cover design for Holiday magazine took center stage on magazine stands across the country. Labor Day is about celebrating our work, and I can't think of a better way to celebrate this Labor Day than share this work of George Giusti (1908-1990); one of the most innovative designers and illustrators of the last century. His brilliant cover design of the deconstructed numeral 2 for this Labor Day tribute was Giusti's third of many Holiday covers he turned out in the 1950s and 60s. It is emblematic of much of his later design work, as you can see in the rest of his Holiday magazine covers below. Illustration was a passion and a strength for Giusti, and he understood how to reduce basic elements to their simplest form and to avoid distracting details. He was never fearful of using color boldly, and never hesitated to extend his designs beyond the borders of the page in order to create visual impact. Every magazine cover was a poster he would say, and by applying the theme and the graphic detail; this would equal a winning formula. Over his long career, he continued to design numerous magazine covers for Fortune, Interiors, Modern Packaging, Time, Town & Country, and Scientific American, along with many memorable book covers, album covers, posters and editorial design work. 
     Giusti first emigrated to the United States in 1938, after a successful career in advertising in Milan and Zurich. After winning numerous design awards and recognition from his peers, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Art Directors Club of New York in 1979. He spent the majority of his career in New York, and was always a tireless worker.   

A couple of side notes: I have no evidence of knowing if Giusti was responsible for updating Holiday's masthead in 1960, but as you can see, the kerning and the type were greatly enhanced at that time.
     Robert Zimmerman discovered an interesting design lesson by George Giusti from a 1959 correspondence school publication by the Famous Artists School, titled the Principles of Experimental Design. In this article, Guisti demystifies his own design process for the April 1958 Holiday cover on England. You can read it here. 
::Images sourced from Ad Art Gallery.

Japanese Shipping Line Journals

Cover designs for the monthly travel magazine The Sea, published in Japan for the shipping line Osaka Shosen Kaisha (OSK), a rival of the NYK Lines. Most of these colorful cover designs are from the late 1930s and early 40s. The OSK was a very popular shipping line for many years, offering luxury round-the-world service for well-heeled passengers. After Pearl Harbor, much of the fleet was either requisitioned for the war effort or destroyed during WWII. In 1964 OSK merged with the Mitsui Steamship Co. to form the Mitsui OSK Lines which is still in operation today.
::Available from the Boston Book Company.   

Mayflower Power, Part 2

In my earlier research on the late 19th C horticulturist John Lewis Childs (1856-1921), I came across a few of his illustrated bookplates in a collection at the Harold T. Clark Library in Cleveland. An astute library volunteer by the name of Rebecca Molton-de-Greeff had discovered a collection of Childs' books on ornithology and noticed they each had a different bookplate attached with hand-lettered and hand-painted images of birds. Her research lead her to Childs colorful career as "a successful businessman and politician whose love of nature influenced both his business and leisure pursuits".
      As I mentioned in my previous post, Childs began the first seed catalog business in the US and published The Mayflower magazine which were both widely distributed. He also had one of the finest private ornithology libraries in the US which included Audubon's rare Birds of America. Molton-de-Greeff's research also lead her to the blog of Lew Jaffee, who is a self-confessed bookplate junkie. He has 3 of Childs' scarce bookplates in his own collection: they contain a flower, and insect and a frog seen here. Jaffee speculated that the artists Childs hired to illustrate his colorful seed catalogs were likely responsible for the bookplate illustrations as well. His assumption was also confirmed by a contact at the Floral Park Historical Society on Long Island where Childs' seed and bulb business first began. Although this bookplate artist is long forgotten, they claimed there were many artists employed by Childs over the years, including one who lived on-site to help publicize his botanical merchandise.
      These unnamed illustrators and letterers were some of the first and finest commercial artists in the US. When Childs created one of the very first publishing empires in NY, he likely provided these gifted artists their first start at a career. (I give Childs credit for recognizing and encouraging their talents too.) I suspect many were untrained, but may have been influenced by sign makers, printers and typesetters of the day. The late 19th century was truly the golden age of typography and printing in the US and I do wish there was more of a public record of these amazing artists who helped make it so. I am however, very grateful for the beautiful archive of some of their work seen below. This and more are now included in the incredible digital archive of the Smithsonian. 

Mayflower Power

Nothing says May Day more than some fine hand-lettered mastheads from The Mayflower magazine. (Guess it is time to dust the snow off the Letterology masthead itself as Spring is in full color and I'm late for the party.) The Mayflower magazine was founded by noted horticulturist John Lewis Childs (1856-1921) in 1885. When it folded over 20 years later, it had reached an international circulation of half a million copies. Childs also established one of the first mail order seed catalogs in the US, based in Floral Park, Long Island and was receiving up to 8000 orders per day. By 1892 he had several hundred acres with glass greenhouses, seed beds, seed stores, housing, a lumber mill, and a printing press where he employed numerous nameless artists to design his elaborately illustrated magazines and seed catalogs. Nearly every issue of The Mayflower monthly displayed an entirely hand-rendered, new or modified masthead. Child's magazine and seed catalogs soon became wildly successful and he went on to build the first school in Floral Park, served as the first town mayor and later NY state senator, and ran two unsuccessful campaigns for US Senator. 
      The colorful 1892 issue of The Mayflower above is from American Gardening. All of the other magazine covers shown below are listed by dates in consecutive order. The 1893 through 1896 issues are from Period Paper. 1899 through 1902 issues are from here. May the seeds of these lovely lettering and cover designs, cast by countless unnamed artists, provide lasting inspiration to your own typographic endeavors.