Seen in an antique store in Detroit Lakes, Minnesota on June 28, 2002.
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Saw this at Mystic Blue Signs in New Orleans last summer during TypeCon. It was in a big old French book about lettering and engraving. I wish I’d written down some information about it. I think it was from around 1880. Heard from someone that it is from 1859.
The alphabet on this particular page was very unexpected. It looks almost like Avant Garde in some ways. And dig that crazy “g”! Way ahead of its time.
I just discovered today that my old pal, illustrator Dan Picasso, has a new website. danpicasso.com. Back in the eighties, Dan and I worked together at MPR and later shared an office together as freelancers. We’ve drifted apart since then.
Dan uses a real airbrush in his work—none of this Photoshop nonsense. Most of the works displayed on his site are new to me. He’s done some amazing pieces of lettering design. He definitely had an influence on my taste for lettering and type. And I love the car paintings. I don’t think I’ve seen them before.
Recently, my family and I paid a visit to West Virginia for my in-laws’ anniversary. While we were there, my partner, Pat, came across a little place called Fill ’er Up with Memories in Berkeley Springs. I wasn’t with her at the time, but happily she had our camera with her and, knowing how I love this kind of thing, took some photos.
The place itself is a kind of museum in which the proprietor, David Weidemoyer, has put on display his personal collection of “petroliana” as well as his wife’s doll collection and an assortment of toys. It’s not a store, but he’s interested in selling some of the petroliana stuff. He’s become more interested in enameled signs.
When I was a little kid, I had a toy gas station very similar to this. It was made of lithographed tin and plastic. I seem to recall spending a lot of time with it. Kids are strange little creatures.
Some oil cans. I love the script lettering on the Artex can. Not a bit of type on any of these—it’s all hand-lettering.
Old gas price sign. Dream on.
(All photos by Pat Thompson, taken on September 4, 2005.)
