TYPE DESIGN INFORMATION PAGE last updated on Thu Nov 28 19:05:00 EST 2024

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LUC DEVROYE

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Charles Percival Bluemlein

Charles Percival (or just Percy) Bluemlein (b. 1891) served in the 346th Infantry in World War I. In 1920, he married Mildred Vanderbilt and settled in Brooklyn, NY. He died in 1944 and is buried in the Long Island National Cemetery in Farmingdale, NY. Famous for his scripts and penmanship, his best known book is Script and Manuscript Lettering (1947, Higgins Ink Co, Brooklyn). Earlier editions are from 1943 and 1944 and have Bertram Cholet and Dorothy Sara (1943 edition only) as co-authors.

Modern revivals of his scripts include

• KolinskySable SG (Jim Spiece, 2004), based on a 1944 brush design called Mr. Ronald G. Sheppards.
• Bender Script (2008) by Alison Argento. She writes: Would you hire one of the top hand lettering artists that worked for companies like Max Factor for your designs? Of course you would! Chas Bluemlien passed away many years back, and you couldn't have afforded his services anyway, but his lettering prowess which graced many advertisements, primarily cosmetic ads, has been pulled together from numerous samples to make this font.
• Alejandro Paul's Bluemlein Scripts (2004-2005, Umbrella and Veer) are based on Bluemlein's alphabets from the book cited above: Miss Le Gatees, Mr Rafkin, Mr Keningbeck, Mr Lackboughs, Lady Dawn, Mrs Von Eckley, Mr Sheppards, Mr Dafoe, Mr Canfields, Mr Stalwart, Mr Sandsfort, Mr Leopolde (and later, Mr. Leopolde Pro), Mr DeHaviland, Mr Blaketon, Miss Stanfort, Miss Packgope, Miss Fajardose, Mrs Saint-Delafield, Mrs Blackfort, Mr Sopkin, Mr Sheffield, Miss Lankfort, Herr Von Muellerhoff, Dr Sugiyama, Dr Carbfred. In 2011, that series was made available at Google Web Fonts. Al;ejandro writes: From the early 1930s through World War II, there were about 200 professional hand letterers working in New York City alone. This occupation saw its demise with the advent of photo lettering, and after digital typography, became virtually extinct.
• Soft Horizon's Lainie Day (1993) is an earlier free font in the style of Paul's Lady Dawn and Mr Lackboughs.
• In 2012, Intellecta Design got into the act and promised to digitize the entire series under the name Bluelmin instead of Bluemlein. They created Bluelmin Kisaburo, Bluelmin Ralph (2012), Bluelmin Ronald (2012), Bluelmin Sandsfort (2012) and Bluelmin Benedict (2012).

Credits: Several of the images below, as well as some biographical information, are courtesy of Charles's grandson, David Musgrave.

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