Van Winkle Lower Case

The typecase lay is that shown by Van Winkle, The Printers' Guide, 1818, New York. It is closely followed by subsequent lays such as MacKellar of 1866 onwards. However MacKellar shows 5em spacing, not hairs, and reverses the position of w and , although ATF 1906 etc, restore the w , position. There is some minor variation in other later lays, eg BB&S of 1890s have fl in the upper case. Apart from the reversal of w , note also the boxes above the i box, which are divided and start the figures, whereas English cases have an undivided box for spacing (see for example Oldfield).

The companion upper case lay is Van Winkle and the empty lower case configuration is U.S.Lower, which remained unchanged thereafter, apart from the occasional variant such as Adams, or MacKellar New, or Hamilton Boss, or Rooker.