John Baskerville was born in 1706 in Worcestershire, England. As a servant in a clergyman’s house, it was his employer that discovered his penmanship talent and sent him to learn writing. Baskerville was illiterate, but became very interested in calligraphy, and practiced handwriting and inscription that was later echoed in strokes and embellishments in his printed typeface (Yau, 2010). At seventeen, he was engraving tombstones. By the time he was twenty he was teaching, writing, bookkeeping, and running an engraving business as well. At thirty-two, he took up the then popular lacquering process that we all call japanning, this made him a very wealthy man. John Baskerville was forty-four when he took up the business for which he is known today (Lienhard, 1988).
In 1750 he setup a printing business, But it took him till 1757 to produce his first book. Cambridge University Press hired him as their printer, here is where he made his masterpiece, the Holy Bible of 1763, and many regarded it, to be the finest book printed in English. After five long years of labor, he produced what might be the most beautiful bible yet made. His other noted works are Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained and Book of Common Prayers (Lienhard, 1988).
John Baskerville developed his own method of working, resulting in beautiful bright woven paper and darker inks. He created an intense black ink color through the tedious process of boiling fine linseed oil to a certain thickness, dissolving rosin, and allowing it to subside for months and finally grinding it down before using it. Baskerville followed other printers closely and made the same purchases as them in hopes of setting up the same press. This routine resulted in the development of higher standards for presses altogether. Existing printing presses did not capture the subtitles of his type, so Baskerville redesigned the press replacing the wooden platens with a brass one in order to allow the planes to meet more evenly. The wooden platens were usually covered with thick tympanum, which helped to absorb pressure and reduce type depth. However, Baskerville’s press used thin tympanum around the metal and the platens were even heated before using them. It was the combination of the contrasting cut in his letterform, the process of printing, the gloss of his paper and the intensity of his inks that made each print so refined (Yau, 2010).
The works of Italian renaissance printers, like his English contemporary, William Caslon, influenced Baskerville’s type. The Baskerville font was born in 1754. It is most known for its crisp edges, high contrast and generous proportions. John Baskerville improved existing types, inks, and presses and produced a clearer blacker type than any of his contemporaries. His letterforms were also wider and his italics showed his calligraphic mastery. Unfortunately, his type was severely criticized due to the thickness of the strokes. His work was dismissed as the work of an amateur. Critics maintained that his type “hurt the eyes” and would be “responsible for blinding the nation”(Monoecus, 2005). It was a commercial failure and wasn’t revived until the early 20th century. However, his influence on type and printing spread to Italy and France where Giovanni Battista, Bodoni, and the Didots furthered his ideas (Monoecus, 2005)
He has been called “the greatest printer England ever produced”, but was very much disliked by his contemporaries. It wasn’t till 1920 that Baskerville finally won the attention he had always merited. Benjamin Franklin who already had a successful printing business was an admirer of Baskerville. They met in Birmingham in 1758 and Franklin returned to the US with Baskervilles work, popularizing it through its adoption as one of the standard typefaces employed in the Federal Government Publishing (Pardoe, 1975).
Many book publishers use the Baskerville typeface due to its clean and crisp appearance. Baskerville is used in many older book reproductions so it will give the book a charming feeling. Many document use the Baskerville Font as well because it will give it a more classical feel to the document. The Canadian government also uses a modified version of the typeface, most notably the Canadian word-mark.
Reference
Lienhard, H, John. (1998). The Engines of Ingenuity. Retrieved From: www.uh.edu
