![]() ![]() Card from Arthur Rushmore to members of The Typophiles. Ginger, authors of Stop Stealing Sheep and Find Out How Type Works (Mountain View, California: Adobe Press, 1993), explain the title of their book thusly: Library, Rochester Institute of Technology)Įrik Spiekermann and E.M. In 1936, Frederic Goudy was in New York City to receive an award for excellence in type design. Upon accepting a certificate, he took one look at it and declared that, “Anyone who would letterspace black letter would steal sheep.” This was an uncomfortable moment for the man sitting in the audience who had hand lettered the award certificate. ![]() once observed, Anyone who would letterspace lowercase would steal sheep. You might have noticed that our book cover reads “lower case,” while here it reads “black letter”-two very different things.… Goudy later apologized profusely, claiming that he said that about everything. Even though Gutenberg may or may not have invented the process, it was he who. is blackletter, a facsimile of Gutenbergs printing, which emulated the appearance of. We’re not sure how “black letter” got changed to “lower case,” but we’ve always known it to be the latter whichever way, it makes infinite sense. Famous American type designer Frederic Goudy once said Anyone who would letterspace lower case would steal sheep, and German type designer Erik Spiekermann resonates in his book Stop. Anyone that would letterspace blackletter would steal sheep. Bugbread, I've been trying to convince people that 'ye' is not 'ye' but 'the' (and, I suppose, 'you' is really 'thou'). With the publication of their book, Spiekerman and Ginger popularized Goudy’s phrase But exactly what Goudy was complaining about and exactly how he phrased his complaint has since been a matter of debate both in print and online. 'Anyone who would letterspace blackletter would screw sheep.' Not to be pedantic, but he said 'would STEAL sheep,' not screw/ He was speaking in public, and peopel didn't talk like that in public back then. The online Urban Dictionary says, “Anyone who would letterspace lower case would steal sheep.” Typography consultant Ilene Strizver concurs, listing the act as no. ![]() Similarly, lawyer and typographer Matthew Butterick writes, “Typographer Frederic Goudy is famously credited with opining that ‘Anyone who would letterspace lowercase would steal sheep.’ But a few sources claim that his original comment concerned blackletter fonts, not lowercase, and that he used a more colorful verb than ‘steal.'” 8 on her list of “Top Ten Type Crimes.”* Talk:Design says that “lowercase” is a misquote, and that “blackletter” was the target of Goudy’s ire. ![]()
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