Kirby Cracker is a caps-only variation of Helvetica Bold with closed counters and added stars. According to Modern Publicity 1973, it was created under Alan Fletcher’s direction at Pentagram, apparently as a custom typeface for a client named Missen. London-based photosetting service Conways carried this face under the name Telstar by January 1974.

The same year, it was chosen for the cover of an album with progressive jazz and funk by East German by band leader Klaus Lenz (b. 1940), featuring singers Uschi Brüning and Klaus Nowodworski. The names are added in Herold. The album was released on the Polish Muza label, with liner notes by Werner Sellhorn. Three years later, Klaus Lenz left the GDR and moved to West Germany.

[More info on Discogs]

Byte magazine, issue #4, December 1975

Bill Godbout was something of a pioneer in the early microcomputer movement of the 1970s, and his firm Bill Godbout Electronics was a commercial vehicle selling discount and surplus electronics and microcomputer components. Bill Godbout Electronics was a regular advertiser in the early issues of the seminal BYTE magazine. Issue #4 is the first Christmas issue and features a 2-pager from Bill Godbout Electronics that mixes a large number of fonts in a style typical of both this era and this advertiser.

“Bill Godbout Electronics” is in Wexford. I think the “CAVE grafix” is lettering, but the first word may be based on Koloss (see further below). “Wish you a joyous holiday season” and so in is in Davida. “If you are into toyful tinkering” and so on is in outlined Cooper Black.

“Son-of-a Cheap Clock” is in Tonight, and above it “We have a successor to our very popular ‘Cheap Clock Kit’!” is in Script (for the IBM Selectric; see also the body fonts, glossed below). The price, $14.50, is in Umbra. Both Script and Umbra are used on the following page.

Windsor is used for “they also make great gifts” (on the curve) and the following text. “Electronic Projects for Musicians” is Reklameschrift Herold. Below the decorative band, “EROM board special offer” is in Helvetica, outlined and with a South shadow.

“4K x 8 pre-programmed for 8080” is in an outline style of a somewhat Microgramma-like font that I couldn’t identify that is also used on the second page.

On the second page, “Bigger & Better” is in Skin & Bones (using two alternates for G, but not for E). “Pace 16 bit chip set” is in Koloss. “1 Pace 16 bit CPU” and other text on and under the curve is the previously mentioned and unidentified outline Microgramma-lookalike.

“Pace Data Packet” is Advertisers Gothic (using the A without a top flag). “4K x 8 RAM kit” is in Umbra. “EROM board kit” is in Rock Opera. The “8K x 8” and so on again is in Wexford. “There’s more ... We have” is in Monogram.

The body text (and some secondary and subtitle text) is typewritten in a variety of fonts, and I did a much better job of identifying those, all available on the IBM Selectric:

On the first page the text for the clock, starting “BIGGER DIGITS” is in Artisan. “By Craig Anderton” (the author of “Electronic Projects for Musicians”) is in Orator (probably, in any case Orator is used on the next page).

The text for the Craig Anderton blurb is Adjutant, I think. Delegate and Adjutant are very similar with only slight differences in weight and thick/thin contrast, but they have different pitches: Adjutant is 12 characters per inch, and is tighter than Delegate at 10. The text block at the bottom of the first page, starting “By special arrangement”, is in Bookface Academic.

On the second page, below “Pace 16 bit”, the text starting “This chip set gets you into PACE” is in Manifold. The word “PACE” itself is in another font (the Selectric had a feature where you could switch type-balls and still retain the cursor position), possibly Pica. Manifold is again used for the bottom paragraph starting “READOUTS, LEDS, TRANSISTORS”. Below “Pace Data Packet”, “Since we started advertising” is Orator. Below “4K x 8 RAM”, “Note the lower price” looks like Prestige Elite.

Below “EROM BOARD”, the text starting “Now you can stuff up to 8K” initially had me stumped, but I think I have tracked it down. The small caps in place of little letters, made me think of Orator, which it isn’t; the o is distinctly squaroid and reminded me of the output of the IBM lineprinters, such as the 1403. It turns out that the IBM Selectric has a typeball called AN3/360 which the 1972 brochure specifically says matches the AN3 style available on IBM’s lineprinters.

At the bottom of the second page, to the right of the wordmark, the payment and terms text starting “YOU MAY PLACE MASTERCHARGE® OR BANKAMERICARD® ORDERS” is in Script.

These posters were designed by Zdeněk Vlach for a 1989 Czechoslovak release of the 1976 King Kong film directed by John Guillermin. The title type is Reklameschrift Herold, which we’ve seen in use for creepy purposes before, in Hellbore magazine.

Vlach (1942–1999) studied at the Art School in Prague, but didn’t graduate. He nevertheless embarked on a career as graphic artist, illustrator, and film and set designer. Between 1970 and 1989, he created 203 movie posters. [ART+]

The small print on this DIN A4 mini poster combines the bold weight of Universal Grotesk for John Guillermin’s name with Super-Grotesk.

The cover features Romanisch (two weights) and Eckmann. The latter is used with the long s (ſ in “Nebst”), the former isn’t (in “seine”).

This guide to Trier and the surrounding area was issued in 1905 by Heinrich Stephanus. The local publisher and book seller was established in 1878 and still is in business today. The cover and the title page bring together a number of typefaces that were typical for the place and time. The building shown at the top right is the Porta Nigra, a city gate from Roman times.

A captivating Op Art poster for the Theater der Freien Volksbühne from 1969. Since 1963, this West Berlin branch of the Volksbühne Berlin used a venue on Schaperstraße, which today is known as Haus der Berliner Festspiele. Striped on the outside, the depicted house has open doors and windows, allowing a glimpse into the turbulent inner life.

The poster is by Jürgen Spohn (1934–1992). Born in Leipzig and also known as Hans Jürgen Spohn, he studied graphic design in Kassel, under Hans Leistikow and Hans Hillmann, among others. In 1961 Spohn moved to West Berlin and began his freelance work as a graphic designer and children’s book author. In 1972 Spohn was appointed professor at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste Berlin (today UdK Berlin).

The typeface is Herold, which started life in Berlin at the Berthold foundry in 1901. The pattern of concentric circles reminds me of Stripes (see this ad for Tonibral), but that multiline face didn’t exist before 1973. Spohn used this pattern already in 1967 for another poster design.

Towards the end of a holiday first in Slovakia then in the Czech Republic in June 2019 I unfortunately lost my Olympus E-PL1 digital camera. However, fortunately for the last day I had an Olympus Trip 35 film camera as a back-up and this is one of the photos I took on that last day, of the Laurin & Klement statues outside the Škoda Museum in Mladá Boleslav, where I was visiting primarily for being the birthplace, on 25th December 1949, of Valérie Čižmárová's sometime theatrical colleague, Miluška Voborníková.

The statues, in honour of the co-founders of Laurin & Klement, the predecessor to Škoda Auto, Václav Laurin and Václav Klement, were created by Michal Moravec (b. 1951) and installed in 2005. The sign with their names uses Reklameschrift Herold. This display typeface by the Berthold foundry was first cast in 1901, six years after the two automotive pioneers founded their company, and four years before they started producing cars.

This album showing 63 models of cottages and rural architecture was published by Albin Michel, Paris, in 1912. The hardcover edition measures 37×27 cm and has 175 pages, with 63 plates illustring small rural constructions with groundfloors. It’s bound in green half cloth with colored illustrated boards.

The title page shown above exhibits a colorful mix of typefaces from the Belle Époque. The first line is set in a typeface issued by Deberny & Cie around 1900 as Les Modernes. Today it’s better known under the name used by English foundry Stephenson Blake, De Vinne Ornamented. “Modèles de Contrats” shows the condensed width, Les Modernes étroit. “Album de 63 Modèles” uses a typeface with American roots: Washington (Central, c. 1886) was available from various European foundries, including Haas in Switzerland (as Columbia) and Van Loey-Nouri in Brussels (as Fantaisies). The largest type is German: Herold was first cast by Berthold in 1901. It has several alternates and is here used with two different forms for C. The condensed sans serif used in all caps is unidentified. The italic chosen for the line below is the one from Grasset (Peignot & Fils). Its roman is used in all caps for “avec prix à forfait” (without accents). The publisher’s name is set in Française, which is a narrow version of Auriol.

See more plates from this book in the Flickr album by Patricia M (taffeta).

Hellebore is a collection of writings and essays devoted to British folk horror and the themes that inspire it: folklore, myth, history, archaeology, psychogeography, witches, and the occult.

The first issue of the A5 limited-run magazine edited by Maria J. Pérez Cuervo was published on Samhain 2019 and is dedicated to the topic of human sacrifice. The cover art is Come Unto The Corn by Paul Watson. Additional artwork was provided by Eli John. Hellebore is being art directed by Nathaniel Hébert of Winter-Hébert, who comments:

The masthead was adapted from an Edwardian typeface, Herold AKA “Reklameschrift Herold”. For Hellebore, I gave the letterforms an art-nouveau facelift by way of the 70s.

Reklameschrift Herold was designed by Hermann Hoffmann and first cast by the Berthold type foundry in 1901. The series was later expanded by schmal (compressed), Kontur (outline), and fett (bold) styles. There are a number of digitizations as well as contemporary reinterpretations (see the typeface page for details). In Herold, all the weight is distributed around the top and bottom of the letters, giving it a squeezed, claustrophobic feel.

The Hellebore logo exclusively shows its high-waisted caps. The modifications make it look as if just emerged from a swamp. Hébert increased the flabbiness of Herold’s already wobbly contours, with more pronounced concaves. Most notably, the R became gaunt, exhibiting a smaller eye and a limpish leg.

Herold also appears for headlines, in unmodified (or less heavily modified) form. It’s paired with Berton Hasebe’s Portrait Condensed (Commercial Type, 2013). I’m not saying there’s something inherently eerie about Portrait, but the first documented Use was David Pearson’s cover for the Bonnier Pocket edition of The Shining.

Mono release

Super song. Great British 1960s Beat.

The Grapefruit were the first signing to The Beatles’ Apple Publishing company, and the launch party to celebrate the event was attended by various fans, plus Donovan and a bearded Brian Jones. Paul McCartney even directed a promo film for the band’s “Elevator” single at London's Albert Memorial. — Opulent Conceptions

“Dear Delilah” was Grapefruit’s inaugural single, which peaked at number 21 in the UK Singles Chart in the spring of 1968. The sleeves for both German releases use Herold.

Stereo release

German edition of Jardí vora el mar (1967) by Mercè Rodoreda (1908–1983). With a preface by Roger Willemsen. Translated from the Catalan by Kirsten Brandt.

For the title, the letterforms of Herold (1901) were rendered with woodcut-like contours, assumably to blend better with the illustration.

Hotel Zlatá Husa (“Golden Goose”) at Wenceslas Square in Prague was designed by architect Emil Králíček together with Matěj Blecha in 1909–10. The typeface used for the neon sign is a match in period: Herold was issued in 1901. Note the monogram at the top: ‘Z’ and ‘h’ form a goose.

German ad for a photo shop in Stockholm, Sweden, 1914. The depicted camera is by Ernemann A.-G., Dresden — a forerunner of Zeiss Ikon.

The condensed typeface with reversed contrast is Berthold’s Herold (1901–7). Note the use of two different forms for ‘g’ in “Fotografiska Magasin”.

The bold wide Roman with blunt serifs looks a lot like Windsor (Stephenson Blake, 1903) — especially with the splayed arch of ‘n’ — but it actually is Breite Kolonial (c. 1906). Kolonial is Wilhelm Woellmer’s version of Post Oldstyle Roman No. 2 (ATF, 1901). Woellmer released the regular weight in 1904 and added five more styles until c. 1911 [Hans Reichardt]. The shaded style, Schraffierte Kolonial (1906), is based on Curtis Post, which “was produced by ATF in 1902 for the Saturday Evening Post magazine of Curtis Publishing Company, but soon released to printers in general” [Mac McGrew via Luc Devroye]. Post Oldstyle Roman No. 2/Kolonial was also available from several other typefoundries, including the Lettergieterij Amsterdam (as Columbia) and the H.C. Hansen Foundry of Boston (as Buffalo) [Jaspert]. Digital interpretations include Saturday Morning Toast by Nick Curtis and the hatched 1906 Fantasio by GLC.

See more such ads in Altpapiersammler’s Flickr stream.

in: Neue Zürcher Zeitung, April 1920.