C. F. DRURY for Latest POST CARDS

C.F. Drury was a printer and publisher in Southport, England, north of Liverpool. This advert for postcards was probably printed around 1900, based on the featured typefaces. Regina-Kursiv is the youngest of the four: it originated in 1895 at the Berthold foundry. It was also sold in the UK, including by James Marr and Co. in Edinburgh.

From Eye magazine:

End papers from Penrose’s Pictorial Annual, 1899, letterpress. This edition of the Annual devoted considerable space to the then emerging three-colour process. Among the articles was ‘Six colours from three. An object lesson for the printer’ for which the end papers served as illustrations. They demonstrated the range of colours generated by the three process inks, while simultaneously functioning as backgrounds for companies advertising relevant expertise.

The article’s author was justifiably pleased with the idea and its outcome: ‘To the purely artistic mind, the result shown on these end papers may appear crude and perhaps vulgar, but to the thousands of printers throughout the country who are not familiar with the subject, and who find it difficult to understand, we think this simple object lesson will explain more eloquently than the most elaborate supplement the powers of the three-colour process’

The endpapers advertise the the Measured Colour Filters by Sanger-Shepherd, an emerging company in the field of color photography, and the services of Carl Hentschel, Ltd. Founded by Carl Hentschel (1864–1930), inventor of the Hentschel-Colortype process, this reproduction firm “produced engravings for numerous forms of printed media”.

The largest words are set in Columbus, with its distinctive curly forms for C and O. It’s paired with De Vinne (“Sanger-Shepherd”, “Penrose & Co.” (with alternate S), “Fleet Street” etc.) and the related Heyer (“Photo-Engravers”). “Carl Hentschel Colortype Process” uses a version of Regina-Kursiv.

La Libertà Economica was an economics magazine founded in Bologna in November 1903 by Alberto Giovannini (who recognized himself as a pupil of Tullio Martello and therefore he followed the so-called “Ferrara school”) and directed by him until it ended its publications in 1926.

When at the congress of Bologna (October 8-10, 1922) a series of groups of varied liberal inspiration tried to give themselves a national organizational structure founding the Italian Liberal Party, Giovannini became its secretary and his magazine in some way the organ up to the end of its publication.

(source: “Dizionario del liberalismo italiano”, Rubbettino Editore, 2011).

The magazine’s masthead uses Herman Ihlenburg’s Columbus (MacKellar, Smiths & Jordan, 1890), which is used in smaller point sizes for other indications on the front and back cover. Columbus was locally available from Urania under the name Columbia (later also from Società Augusta as Victor Hugo and from Reggiani as Rossana).

Other typefaces used are Old Style Extended (Central Type Foundry, circa 1892), Regina-Kursiv (Berthold, circa 1895, available from Augusta as Mercurio), Latin Condensed (Stephenson Blake, 1873), Murillo (Schelter & Giesecke, 1897, carried by Urania as Estienne), and an unidentified Modern/Scotch with italic and bold. The condensed grotesque used at the bottom appears to be Bauer’s Neueste schmale Grotesk or similar. The light sans used for the number and date at the top as well as for “Succursali” looks like Schelter & Giesecke’s Breite magere Grotesk, which was sold by Reggiani as Eia.

Ad for snap fasteners by Prym, Germany’s oldest family business, founded in 1530 and still in the haberdashery business.

Ad for Hoh & Hahne in Leipzig, specialist for photography supplies, 1900

“Noblest Christmas tree hangings”, wrapped in parchment paper.

Detail