Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps; Free Featured Font: 3270font; Free Featured Font: Libre Caslon Condensed

Today’s Drop features a gorgeous collection of intricate typography found in a somewhat unusual setting, plus two free fonts.

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TL;DR

(This is an AI-generated summary of today’s Drop using Ollama + llama 3.2 and a custom prompt + VSCodium custom extension.)

• Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps exemplify artistry in their unique, hand-drawn letterforms created specifically for each context. (https://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/2011/02-insurance-map-typography.html).
• The 3270font project brings the classic aesthetic of the IBM 3270 that terminals maintain a visually appealing appearance, with various versions download (https://github.com/rbanfffont).
• Libre Caslon Condensed is an open-source serif typeface offering a condensed alternative to the venerable Libre Calson typeface. (https://github.com/ertekinno/lib-condensed).

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Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps

The typography and lettering in Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps exemplifies exceptional craftsmanship and artistry. Rather than using standardized fonts, each map’s title page and headers featured unique, hand-drawn letterforms created specifically for that context. These ornate designs were typically engravings, crafted by artisans skilled in creating custom letterforms rather than arranging pre-existing typography.

The ornamental flair across Sanborn maps was remarkably diverse, with no two towns sharing identical typographic styles. This individualization served a deeper purpose beyond mere decoration — it instilled a sense of pride and uniqueness for each mapped location while maintaining the cartographic tradition of decorative embellishment. You can scroll through a gallery of clipped, cropped and isolated town title pages over at BibliOdyssey.

The maps themselves employed a sophisticated system of symbols, colors, and abbreviations to convey complex information clearly. Color played a crucial role — pink indicated brick and tile structures, yellow denoted wooden frames, olive green showed fire-resistant construction, and blue represented concrete and cinder block materials. The maps utilized various line types to indicate structural features: solid lines for walls, broken lines for doorways, and extended lines to show fire wall heights.

Created by D.A. Sanborn‘s company in 1867, these maps became essential tools for fire insurance underwriting. They meticulously documented everything from building materials to street widths, and from standpipe locations to the presence of flammable chemicals. The maps even recorded detailed business information, noting establishments ranging from conventional stores to more controversial venues like opium dens and gambling parlors. As such, historians and urban planners utilize them to study urban development and architectural evolution. Genealogists find them useful for locating ancestral residences and workplaces. Environmental researchers even consult them to identify historical industrial sites that might have contributed to soil or groundwater contamination.

The website — A Digital Archive of the Art of the Sanborn Fire Maps — serves as another digital archive dedicated to the artistic elements of these maps, particularly their distinctive typography and decorative titles. Curated by Brandon Silverman, the site showcases around 3,500 unique decorative titles from maps drawn before 1923, offering a unique perspective on the artistic craftsmanship of the era. This resource not only preserves the aesthetic aspects of the maps but also provides insight into the design sensibilities of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

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Free Featured Font: 3270font

The IBM 3270 series, introduced in 1971, revolutionized mainframe interactions with its block-oriented terminals, commonly recognized by their distinctive green screens. These terminals facilitated efficient data transfer by sending large blocks of data, known as “data streams”, which minimized the number of I/O interrupts. This design significantly enhanced communication efficiency with IBM mainframes.

The 3270font project, led by Ricardo Bánffy, is a modern adaptation of the original 3270 terminal font. This font traces its lineage from the x3270 font, which was translated from Georgia Tech’s 3270tool (which I, sadly, cannot find), itself meticulously hand-copied from an actual 3270 terminal. The project’s primary goal is to bring the classic aesthetic of the 3270 terminal to contemporary systems, ensuring that terminals maintain a visually appealing appearance.

For Debian/Ubuntu folks, installing the 3270 font is straightforward: simply execute apt-get install fonts-3270. FreeBSD users can install the font using pkg install 3270font. For those without access to system-managed packages, the project provides Adobe Type 1, TTF, OTF, and WOFF versions for download.

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Free Featured Font: Libre Caslon Condensed

The original Libre Caslon font family, developed by Impallari Type, offers a distinctive take on the classic Caslon typefaces. Unlike many digital revivals that draw from 18th-century specimens by William Caslon I and II, Libre Caslon is inspired by the hand-lettered interpretations prevalent in 1950s advertising.

The design process involved extensive research into mid-20th-century American Caslon renditions, particularly those found in Mortimer Leach’s “Lettering for Advertising” and Tommy Thompson’s “How to Render Roman Letter Forms” (direct PDF link). These resources provided a foundation for creating a typeface that balances classic elegance with modern functionality.

Libre Caslon Condensed is an open-source serif typeface that offers a condensed alternative to this venerable type family. It “offers a harmonious blend of elegance and readability, making it an ideal choice for various design projects.”

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(I’m just gonna drop this into this unadorned section for cathartic reasons.)

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FIN

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