Alphabet Soup: Ten Qs

Sixteen-line wood type and transparent ink

Anatomy of a Letterpress Project

Lame-o us.

Our very first print from our press reads "No. 1 / Duckpin's first impression" and the date. If we had any sense of humor, we'd have done something like this.

Now that's a first impression.

Poop Rainbows, Part Five

Our latest jaunt to the thrift store tapped that fertile color vein we call the Poop Rainbow™. On the left, Marco displays a dinner plate, while our own print devil models an afghan blanket on the right. Who needs Barker's Beauties when we have these two?

The Origin of the Poop Rainbow

While the phenomenon of the poop rainbow™ occupies waaaaay too much of our time, we never really paused to consider its origins. That is, until we saw this obituary in yesterday's Washington Post.

Fans of DC's Metro subway system owe a debt of gratitude to the recently deceased Cleatus Barnett. According to the obit, he was a staunch advocate for Metro's unique aesthetic, as embodied by its original design. Let's hear it from the Post:

Mr. Barnett was a staunch defender of Metro's original orange, gold and brown interior hues. He had helped choose the color-combination and resisted efforts to change it, even when popular opinion deemed it an ugly throwback to bygone times.

Eventually, train chairs were upholstered in burgundy and blue. But in deference to Mr. Barnett, seats at the front and back of each car retained the old palette. The chairs are known as "Cleatuses."

Some think that finding the origin of a rainbow leads to a pot of gold. In this case, it leads to the late Mr. Barnett. Thank you, sir, for introducing the poop rainbow™ to the Nation's Capital. You can rest easy knowing that others appreciate your legacy. And, thanks to you, we can rest easy in one of Metro's "Cleatuses."

The First Blog?

Duckpin Press' west coast correspondent brought to our attention a terrific collection of early 20th century photography. What's so special about it? It includes some of the only color photos of small-town, Depression-era America, courtesy of the Library of Congress' collection.

The photo above is from the collection. It features a commercial print shop housed above the offices of the town's newspaper, the Brockton (Mass.) Enterprise. Pasted in the windows are handwritten bills which tell the news of the day, including one with the headline, "Billy Hill is Dead, Aged 41." These posters are updated as news comes in, keeping the locals apprised of current events. Some 70 years later, the Enterprise is still doing exactly the same thing.

And wouldn't you know it, that print shop is still around, too.

Click on photo for larger view.


Headlines posted in street-corner window of newspaper office (Brockton Enterprise). Brockton, Massachusetts, December 1940. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Jack Delano. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

Summer Vacation

It's summer -- time to get yourself a tankful of gas and a cooler full of sandwiches and hit the road. If you're not the chain hotel type, you might enjoy Motel Americana. You'll find a great trove of vintage postcards, including those above (click for larger view). Neon enthusiasts will love the dozens and dozens of motel sign photos as well. For those who can't resist the lure of the road, this should be your first rest stop.

Hang Tags

Recently we did a fun little project for Ilana Kohn, illustrator and clothing designer extraordinaire. The tag measures 1" x 2.5" (we weren't kidding when we said "little") and is blind embossed. We used Airport typeface set in 36pt lead on pearl white Lettra paper. Want your very own tag? You'll just have to buy a dress!

Digital Wood Type Catalog

The city of Austin has always been good to letterpress, and this holds true even in the digital age. The University of Texas at Austin has digitized its Rob Roy Kelly American Wood Type Collection. Besides images of the specimens, the site includes a great history of American type, profiles of different font families, and plenty of resources for further study. This is a true gem of an introduction to wood type.

Samples above are from the collection

Worst Paint Scheme Ever?

When Tony Stewart's crew pulls into Chicagoland Speedway this weekend, they'll be rolling off what has to be the ugliest car so far this year. Office Depot's "back to school" paint scheme looks like a kid who slipped on the way to school and accidentally emptied her backpack's contents all over the sidewalk. This technicolor hodge-podge of shapes and logos has no rhyme or reason, and will look even more ugly at 180 mph than it does standing still. I'd put it up against any of these other ugly schemes any day.

Is this the kind of design we want to be teaching our kids? Yeesh.

Dingbats and Diners

Two years ago, Duckpin spent the Fourth of July hopping around Southeast Arizona. One of the highlights of our stay at the Shady Dell RV park in Bisbee was our morning breakfast at Dot's Diner, the tiny greasy spoon pictured above.

Few things are more joyful than finding the perfect diner when you're on a road trip. But what if you didn't have to hit the road, and instead just leave the front door of your workplace? Well, that's how the first diner was born. In 1872, a small wagon packed with food pulled up in front of the offices of the Providence Journal, ready to feed the newspapermen who, by the time they finished their shifts, found the doors of the town's restaurants locked for the night. According to an article in Mental_Floss magazine, a nickel could buy you a ham sandwich or half a cranberry pie. The wagon proved so popular that imitators soon followed, and eventually the typology of the modern diner was born: round stools fronting a running counter. Just like Dot's.

So who was the wagon owner who first fed the ink-stained wretches at the Journal? It was Walter Scott, an enterprising printing pressman. Seems it took one to know one.

Timewarp Design

In an earlier post, we showcased a book that extols modern design created with age-old technology. Now, from our West Coast correspondent, James, comes word of the Alt1977 project. Alex Varanese has done the opposite: he celebrates today's technology through the lens of yesterday's design. His ads, two of which appear above, tout the power of recent technology to the technophiles of the late 1970s. More spectacular images here.

Click on images to biggify

West Baden Springs

We couldn't help but squeeze in some Indiana sightseeing on the way back from Dave Churchman's. Above are photos from the West Baden Springs Hotel just outside of French Lick. The gorgeous dome was the largest in the world at the time it was built. And for awhile there in the '80s and '90s, it looked like it was going to be unbuilt. After a long period of neglect, the hotel was saved from demolition and recently restored to it's former glory. Well worth the 300-mile detour.

The Duckpin Dueler

Our impending trip to Las Vegas always brings up the inevitable question: what would you do if you won a million dollars?

My answer is above.

Toyota's put together a great site where you can design your own racecar for the price of providing them a fake e-mail address. After you pimp it out, you can take it for a 3-D simulated test-drive, complete with burnouts. It's a wonderful way to spend an hour or twelve. Kinda like dreaming about what you'd do if you won a million dollars.

Wood Type Haul

After returning from a very fruitful trip to Dave Churchman's letterpress warehouse in Indianapolis, we're looking forward to putting our latest finds to work. We bought 6 or 7 fonts of wood type to fill out some missing areas of our collection, plus various lead slugs, rules, borders, etc. that would be too expensive to ship by mail. Kind as always, Dave threw in some extras to make the 1000-mile roundtrip journey well worth our while. But honestly, just seeing all the presses and parts in person is worth it; it's an education you won't find elsewhere.

Pictured are some new acquisitions: an advertising cut and 25-line Playbill wood type

Impressive

The new book Impressive explores the confluence of modern design and age-old production techniques (letterpress, hand-binding, block engraving, etc.). The desire for a handcrafted feel is the common thread among these projects. Though the techniques are traditional, the results are not. Impressive indeed.

Government Printing Office, Part 2

So whatever became of all those forms we saw in the previous post? After their printing they were likely sent to this room -- the bindery -- to be stitched and trimmed into a finished product.

The above bindery photo also comes courtesy of Shorpy's Harris+Ewing Collection. Though at the time this photo was taken (c. 1910) DC's neighborhoods were mostly segregated, the workplace needn't be. The GPO served as a growth environment for many African-American printers, including several who lived in our house. Could this have been Duckpin Press' forebear?...

enlarged from top image

Government Printing Office, Part 1

We're fortunate to live so close to what was once the world's largest printing plant, the Government Printing Office. Being only a mile away from the facility, it would be an easy commute if, instead of being occasional practitioners, we toiled full-time in the Black Art. Perhaps it was this easy commute that appealed to previous occupants of our house. Several GPO printers have called our house home, starting just after the turn of the 20th century.

Shorpy's Harris+Ewing collection has some great glass-plate negatives from the GPO's heyday. We favor this particular shot from the composition room. Note the endless pile of forms sitting in galley trays down the center of the photo. That right there is more type than we'll likely set in our entire life. We kinda get the feeling that the previous occupants of our house are looking down and smirking at our humble basement operation.

enlarged from top image

Take My Ink — Please!

When reading up on one of my favorite comedians, I came across this little nugget on Henny Youngman via Wikipedia:

He grew up in New York City, and his career as a comedian began after he had worked for a number of years at a print shop, where he penned and published a large number of “comedy cards”—cards containing one-line gags that were sold at the shop. The comedy cards were discovered by up-and-coming professional comedian Milton Berle, who encouraged Youngman and formed a close working friendship with him.

Makes perfect sense that the "King of One-Liners" would have started his career this way. It ended some 60 years later, fueled by his violin and jokes that make your dad laugh and your kids groan:

• I take my wife everywhere, but she keeps finding her way back.

• My grandmother is over eighty and still doesn't need glasses. Drinks right out of the bottle.

• My wife dresses to kill. She cooks the same way.

• There was a girl knocking on my hotel room door all night! Finally, I let her out.

• When God sneezed, I didn't know what to say.

• While playing golf today I hit two good balls. I stepped on a rake.

Modernist Poster Sale

Mark your calendars for another inspiring auction of modernist posters. On May 3rd, Swann Galleries will be selling 177 lots of posters dating from the 1890s through the 2000s. Pictured is a collection of our favorites, including a clever and whimsical ad for yo-yos by Raymond Gig. We happen to think it would look fetching in the basement of Duckpin HQ. Hint, hint...

Click on image for larger size.

Dega, Baby!

When the thunder rolls onto NASCAR's longest track this weekend, David Reutimann will be sporting a different, uh, sport on his hood. The Alabama college football champions will be featured on the double zero. Given Dega's history of spectacular crashes -- just ask Carl Edwards about his wild ride last year -- here's hoping the only Crimson Tide we see is Reutimann's paint scheme.