This lettering set, stored in a wooden case, contains ten plastic stencils to draw parts of letters, numbers, and symbols in various sizes. Shift buttons at one end of each rule to allow the letter parts to be lined up correctly. The templates are all marked: THE WOOD-REGAN INSTRUMENT CO. INC., NEW YORK. They also are all marked: WRICO. They also are all marked: LETTERING GUIDE PATENTED 1926.
Three lettering guides are for for drawing numbers and a few miscellaneous signs in three sizes. These are marked VN 240, VN 350, and VN 500. Three lettering guides are for drawing capital letters in differing sizes. They are marked VC 240, VC 350, and VC 500. Finally, lettering guides marked VCN 90, VCN 120, VCN 140, and VCN 175 are for drawing both numbers and capital letters. With all of these lettering guides, drawing a symbol often requires use of more than one opening.
Six metal pens are in cylindrical wooden cases with paper labels. The pens are sizes 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7. In most cases, the number on the pen corresponds to the number on the case. However, the case labeled "LETTERING PEN NO. 6" actually contains a No. 7 pen.
For instruction sheets, see 1986.0790.09 and 1986.0790.10.
Individual lettering guides as well as single pens and sets of lettering guides and pens are described in detail in catalogs of Eugene Dietzgen Company of Chicago. Dietzgen assigned them their own model numbers.
The donor, Philip Krupen (1915–2001), was a physicist who graduated B.S. from Brooklyn College in 1935, worked on the development of the proximity fuse during and after World War II, earned a master's degree in physics from George Washington University, and spent a total of thirty-eight years working for the U.S. government before he retired in 1973.
References:
Catalogue of Eugene Dietzgen Company, Chicago, 1926, pp. 212-213.
Catalogue of Eugene Dietzgen Company, Chicago, 1931, pp. 230-233.
This lettering set is stored in a wooden case. Sixteen plastic lettering guides, a metal guide holder with rough surface, a metal scriber, a plastic scriber adjuster, three metal inkwells, twenty numbered plastic tubes, seventeen points distributed among the tubes, a metal needle holder wrapped in paper and containing six metal needles, a paper envelope containing four needles, and a plastic pen handle are included. A cardboard sheet lists the contents of the set.
Each lettering guide has capital letters, lower case letters, numbers, and symbols written on it. The scriber makes it possible to copy the letters at various angles. The scriber adjuster sets the scriber. The scriber can hold any of three inkwells, which in turn hold different points and needles.
Machinist and museum specialist George A. Norton purchased the pieces of the set in July and September of 1970 at George F. Muth Company in Washington, D.C. He spent a total of $17.38.
For documentation and receipts, see 1989.0572.02 and 1989.0572.03.
An earlier version of the WRICO set, not dependent upon a scriber to translate the letters, appears in a 1926 catalog of Eugene Dietzgen Co.
Reference:
Eugene Dietzgen Company, Catalogue, Chicago, 1926, pp. 212-213.
This clear plastic template has holes in the shape of various pieces of office furniture as well as measuring scales for designing offices. Shapes are drawn to a scale of ¼” to a foot. This particular example was used to plan the layout of offices in the Mechanical and Civil Engineering collections of the Museum of History and Technology (now the National Museum of American History) when it first opened. A mark on the object reads: RAPIDESIGN (/) NO 710 (/) OFFICE PLAN (/) TEMPLATE.
A brown paper sleeve holds the instrument.
Versions of this RapiDesign template sold as early as 1950 and remained on sale at least as late as 2016. In 1963, the instrument cost $1.60.
This small plastic template, also called an erasing shield, contains a variety of curves and a straight bar. It covered correct typing to make it easier to erase errors. A mark at the top reads: THE "LANDIS" (/) PAT D NOV 27 1900.
The template was patented by Mary A. Brown of Washington, D.C., on November 27, 1900.
References:
[Advertisement] “Typewriting Made Perfect. The “Landis” System,” Typewriter and Phonographic World, 8 #6, February, 1902, p. ix. E.S. Bass of New York listed as distributing agent.
Mary A. Brown, “Erasing-Shield for Type-writers,” U.S. Patent 662,591, November 27, 1900.
Mary A. Brown, Typewriting Made Perfect. The "Landis”, M. A. Brown: New York, 1901.
Catalogue of Keuffel & Esser Co., New York, 1909, p. 293. Keuffel & Esser’s model #3411.
Catalogue of Keuffel & Esser Co., New York, 1921, p. 222. The erasing shields shown here are not in the form of Baker’s invention.
This clear plastic rectangular template has a scale of inches from 1 to five inches along the left side, divided to 1/32 inch. It has an unequal scale of degrees along the top and right side which can be used as a rectangular protractor. Cut out of the template are seven rows of figures. The first row has ten squares, ranging in size from 3/4 inch on a side down to 1/8 inch on a side. The next two rows have 19 circles ranging from 1/16 inch in diameter up to 1 inch in diameter. The fourth row has eight hexagons, the fifth row six rectangles, the seventh row an arrow and three ovals and the eighth row five equilateral triangles. In addition there is an arc of a circle, a star, two pointed figures, and an additional small circle.
The instrument fits in a tan paper envelope.
According to both a printed and a penciled mark on the object, it cost $1.00. The donor recalls that he purchased the device while he was working on as a free-lance programmer during his student days at Purdue University.
This clear yellowish plastic rectangular template has a five-inch scale divided to sixteenths of an inch across the top and one divided to tenths of an inch along the bottom. The interior has openings in the shape of circles, hexagons, squares, and triangles with diameters of 1/2, 7/16, 3/8, 11/32, 5/16, 9/32, 1/4, 7/32, 3/16, 5/32, 1/8, and 3/32 inches. A mark on the template reads: RAPIDESIGN No. 19. Another mark reads: SKETCH MATE.
A pen mark on the paper envelope reads: 3914-49. Another one reads: $1. A stamp on the envelope reads: RUTH LUTZ COMPANY (/) 540 Volusia Avenue (/) DAYTONA BEACH, FLORIDA (/) PHONE: 253-3691. The Ruth Lutz Company was founded in 1946 and in business in Daytona Beach in 1965 at the address and telephone number given on the envelope.
A version of this template was available in 2016 from art suppliers as the RapiDesign Sketch Mate R-19 with $14.35 as the list price.
References:
[Advertisement], The Jetstream: Official Newspaper of the Student Body of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical Institute, vol. 1, issue 4, August 5, 1965, p. 6.
Art Supply Warehouse web page, accessed October 17, 2016.
This small steel template was an erasing shield used to correct mistyped text. It contains a variety of curves and straight bars. Holes at the bottom read: K & E CO.
The shield was owned by the donor’s husband, Isaac Giacinto Molella, who graduated from Cornell University with a degree in electrical engineering in 1932.
References:
Accession file.
Catalogue of Keuffel & Esser Co., New York, 1921, p. 222.
Catalogue of Keuffel & Esser Co., New York, 1938, p. 300.
This clear plastic template contains five circles, a rectangle, a square, a parallelogram, and two triangles, along with thirteen pieces of chemical apparatus.
By the 1920s, students studying chemistry in American colleges and universities were expected to keep detailed laboratory notebooks. To help them in this endeavor, laboratory apparatus firms such as Eimer and Amend in New York, as well as CENCO, E.H. Sargent & Co., and W.H. Welch Company (all of Chicago) sold stencils with cutouts in the shape of chemical apparatus. All of these firms sold a stencil that shows the chemical apparatus on this object and the five circles. These stencils were cut off on one side (hence in the shape of trapezoids and not a rectangle) to assist in drawing bent delivery tubes. This eliminated the triangles, square, parallelogram, and rectangle on this instrument.
A template precisely like this one is found in a 1967 catalog of the C-Thru Ruler Company of Bloomfield, Connecticut. Called a “chemistry and math stencil,” it sold for $1.80 a dozen. That catalog also contains a “chemistry stencil” like – but not identical to – those found in the earlier catalogs of chemical supply companies.
The donor presented this object along with a set of drawing instruments by Dietzgen, although the template is not by Dietzgen. The gift was given in memory of his father, Edward Bradley Morrison, and in honor of his son, Joshua Bradley Morrison. The donor had been told that his uncle got the set from a friend who assisted with the restoration of the U.S.S. Constitution; the uncle then gave the set to the donor's father for use in his college studies.
References:
Central Scientific Company, Catalog, Chicago. No stencil with chemical symbols is shown in the May 1909 catalog. One does appear in the 1912 catalog reprinted in 1914, as the #532. From 1919 until 1927 it sold as the model 12790. By 1936 through at least 1960 it was the #18800.
E. H. Sargent & Company, Catalog, Chicago, 1929, p. 721. It showed a “Novic” stencil like those shown by CENCO, Eimar & Amernd, and Welch.
Eimar and Amend, Catalog AA, New York, 1920, p. 515. It too shows a “Novic” stencil.
William M. Welch Catalog, Chicago. A stencil with chemical symbols appeared as model #303 in catalogs from at least 1922 through 1949.
C-Thru Ruler Company, General Catalogue, Bloomfield, Connecticut, 1967, p. 11. This template was model no. 350. C-ThruRuler Company was founded in 1939.
This green plastic template is drawn to a scale of one quarter of an inch to a foot. It has a scale of quarter inches across the top (labeled as feet from 0 to 35), a scale of suggested aisle widths along the right side, and eleven holes. The holes are for letter size and for legal size data boxes (single and double), for data file cabinets, for letter and legal size drawer files, and for desks of differing shape, with chairs. A mark at the center reads: PEOPLE (/) ORIENTED (/) FILING. A mark on the side reads: DATAFILE.
In 1978, a maker of cardboard cartons named Thacker Container Corporation, with headquarters in Santa Fe Springs, California, applied for a trademark for the term DATAFILE, as it related to cardboard cartons. It had just begun to use that term in commerce, and received the trademark the next year. Thacker might have used this template as an advertising device.
These two paper eighty-column IBM punch cards were used as templates for drawing dotted straight lines. One card is blue and has four rows of holes, with a row of symbols across the top. The other card is orange and has three rows of holes with a row of stars across the top. One row of holes on each card has pen marks between the holes.