What do you know about the age of these Mike?

The more I look at number 1 the more I think it is not a font. Duplicate letters are not identical. I know this is possible in OpenType, and that's part of the reason for asking their age.

- Mike Yanega

Hi Mike ....

Not really sure about the age. I saw them in a post last year and have been curious ever since. I think you're probably right about #1.

#2 ... don't much care for it but I was curious.

# 3 Has a charm I rather like.

You are always such a big help!

#3 is frustrating me because I can't see the details well enough. What's happening in the middle of the W, and M? What about the serifs on the T and E? (Trying to use the Serif Guide, but I can't get it narrowed down).

- Mike Yanega

We've seen #2 on a few different posts. In different applications, but never solved any.

I'm guessing these are probably engraving patterns, not fonts, given the general appearance and the fact that the text is the same in each case after the colon. The word before the colon is probably the name of the pattern style (Henry, Reese, and Theodore). Samples in engraving pattern books tend to have text like this (i.e., addresses) so people can imagine how they would look on their own letterhead. Assuming this is correct, the variations are due to the way the patterns are traced by hand with an engraving tool. Engraving patterns sometimes are based on fonts, but often are not.

--nevermind--

Mark makes an extremely convincing case!

Michael

I wouldn't be surprised if the blobby things in the first sample were the result of operator error. I've seen lettering templates that have open areas you're supposed to trace around, not fill in. Could be what happened here. Interesting effect, though. Grunge engraving.