Alf Becker was a talented sign writer and a prolific contributor of unique alphabets to Signs of the Times magazine. More than one hundred of his designs were showcased in monthly installments with each new issue of the publication. One in particular is a casual, free form sans serif design which has been recreated digitally as Casual Signage JNL, and is available in both regular and oblique versions. Thanks to Tod Swormstedt of ST Publications for providing the reference material for this font.

From the cover of the 1932 sheet music for “A Great Big Bunch of You” comes a hand-lettered Art Deco type design; boldly hand lettered with contrasting angled lines and varying character widths. Deco Romance JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

A classic example of Art Deco lettering made with a round nib ink pen was found within the pages of “Lettering” by Harry B. Wright (circa 1950). Now available as a digital type font, Pen Moderne JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The hand lettered title and credits for the 1937 film “Easy Living” (starring Jean Arthur and Edward Arnold) featured playful, casual Art Deco sans serif lettering. This became the working model for Nice and Easy JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

An ad promoting the 1919 silent film comedy “Back Stage” starring Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle was hand lettered in a thick-and-thin sans style with Art Nouveau influences. This lettering is now available digitally as Picture Show JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.

The very first Speedball-Lettering Book was published in 1915, and within its pages was a rough-hewn example of lettering with the name "Rapid Sho-Card Style". The design is now available as Antique Show Card JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.

The Narsinh Series (from the 1940 Gujarati Type Foundry of Bombay, India) is a modular metal font comprised of 32 basic shape pieces which would be assembled into any configuration to form various letters and numbers. Examples of the alphabet and numerals were set in an Art Deco, condensed sans serif and were the basis for this type revival. Strongly resembling a stencil design, the typeface was named after the revered 15th-century poet-saint of Gujarat, India Narsinh Mehta, and the foundry itself gets its name from the language and script of Gujarati [spoken by the Indo-Aryan residents of the Indian state of Gujarat]. Divided Highway JNL is the digital version of this design, and is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The “Trixy Toy Educator” was a 1930s-era set of letters and numbers (along with a few animal shapes) for teaching children, and was manufactured by the Durrel Company of Gardner, Massachusetts. Die cut from thick cardboard, the 40 piece set also included a rack to display the characters, presumably for little ones to practice the correct order of the alphabet and basic numerals or to spell simple words like ‘dog’ or ‘cat’. Whomever came up with the idea, they used the most rudimentary and unusual ‘type design’ shapes in the A-Z and 0-9, but they were just odd enough to inspire a digital type version of them. School Age JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

A 1916 recruitment poster from World War I seeking men to join the Army’s Signal Corps provided the lettering inspiration for Recruitment JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The gently spurred serif hand lettering found on an advertisement for Berkshire Stockings (circa the 1920s) was the inspiration for Nouveau Elegance JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The simple, hand lettered sans serif title on the 1935 sheet music for "Campus Moon" was the design model for Moonlit Night JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The hand lettered opening titles from the 1944 Laurel and Hardy comedy “The Big Noise” served as the inspiration for Movie Screen JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Narrow Nouveau JNL come from the hand lettered title on a 1907 song folio for George M. Cohan's "The Talk of New York", and is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The extra bold, squared Art Deco sans hand lettering found on a 1940s travel poster for the Pennsylvania Railroad inspired Rail Service JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Hand lettering on the cover of the 1932 sheet music for "Sleep, Come On and Take Me" was the basis for Overnight JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Based on text used as sub-headings within a reproduction of a sales catalog for stencil punch dies manufactured by S.M. Spencer & Co. (originally of Brattleboro, VT), circa 1868. Catalog Serif JNL is available in regular, oblique, condensed, condensed oblique, extra condensed, extra condensed oblique, ultra condensed, ultra condensed oblique, compressed and compressed oblique versions.

Linotype Maral is based on an historic Armenian typeface which was originally designed by Henrik Mnatsakanyan. Hrant Papazian has revieved and digitized this four weight type family . Armenian keyboard drivers for Mac OS 9 (and under) as well as for Windows are included when any of the Linotype Maral fonts are purchased. These drivers must be installed before the fonts may be used properly. Linotype Maral will not function properly under Mac OS X, unless you are using the OpenType-format version, which does not work under OS 9! The Linotype Maral family includes four fonts: Linotype Maral Regular, Linotype Maral Oblique, Linotype Maral Bold, Linotype Maral Bold Oblique. The Armenian language is written with its own script. This script and its language are written and spoken in the Republic of Armenia and by the Armenian Diaspora. The Armenian alphabet first appeared around 406 A.D. Its creation is attributed to St. Miesrop Mashtots (died 441), but it is most likely an independent modification and extension of the Greek alphabet created by Gregorian denomination.* * (Source: The book Schrift- und Buchkunst, by Albert Kapr [Leipzig: 1982], references Quadra della storia letteraria della Armenia by Ph. Lukias Somal for this information)

Brush Off JNL is based on the hand-lettered title from the cover of the 1955 sheet music of "Love is A Many Splendored Thing". The unique, artistic and somewhat eccentric letter shapes are both reminiscent of show card lettering and calligraphy. The design is available in both regular and oblique versions.