There isn’t any type on the front and spine of the jacket for John Steinbeck’s novella, and yet it qualifies for the inclusion on Fonts In Use: the freely-drawn caps are clearly based on Cartoon. This caps-only typeface, a design by Howard Trafton, was first cast by Bauer in 1936 – just one year before the book was released. Apart from the fact that repeating letters are not identical, the only real departure from the model is the M and how the center strokes meet – it’s almost like an upside-down W, but not quite.
For the text on the back and the inner flaps, Memphis was paired with the bold display face known as Titanic or Hercules. Its jolly A and M make me think of Robert Crumb’s Keep on Truckin’ cartoon.
3 Comments on “Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, first edition”
What’s the body text for the book?
Hello Michael, do you have a good image of the book’s interior?
The italic used for “All rights reserved” etc. with the single-storey g might be Linotype Old Style No. 1. The title page appears to be in Janson.
Michael, it’s been a while. The Internet Archive has a scanned copy of this edition. I have just added three images showing the interior typography to the post. The text typeface is indeed Linotype Janson, made in 1932 under the direction of C.H. Griffith.