American Type Founders

American Type Founders (ATF) was a business trust created in 1892 by the merger of 23 type foundries, representing about 85% of all type manufactured in the United States.

ATF was the dominant American manufacturer of metal type from its creation in 1892 until at least the 1940s; it continued to be influential into the 1960s. Many fonts developed by American Type Founders in its period of dominance, including News Gothic, Century Schoolbook, Franklin Gothic, Hobo and Bank Gothic, are still in everyday use.

Type founding before ATF

By the beginning of the final decade of the nineteenth century type founding was in a state of crisis. With the introduction of the Linotype, which could cast whole lines of body type in-house, demand for hand-set type was down. Throughout the late 1880s prices were maintained by an informal cartel of foundries, but as the number of foundries increased and with the invention of hot metal type, prices dropped dramatically. Additionally, type at this time was not standardized, either to body size or to base line, and printers resented the incompatibility of types from different foundries. Leaders in the industry, notably Joseph W. Phinney of the Dickinson Type Foundry in Boston, set up a committee to address these problems, eventually recommending consolidation.

List of American Type Founders typefaces

American Type Founders was the largest producer of foundry type in the world, not only of in-house designs, but also from designs that came from merged firms. Many of its designs were created or adapted by Morris Fuller Benton, his father Linn, Joseph W. Phinney or Frederic Goudy.

ATF Designs

These foundry types were designed and produced by American Type Founders: