Author Topic: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay  (Read 3671 times)

Offline Brush My Fennec

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An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« on: November 10, 2015, 09:16:38 AM »
I saw this advertised on e-bay: merely as a bill head. There was just a bit of the writing visible in the scan but it looked good to me so I took a gamble and bought it and lo! It turned out to be an piece of ornamental penmanship. The distance between each of the ruled lines on the page is about 13mm.

From what I've found from searching in the scanned copies of the Penman's Art Journal and the Business Educator: F. H. Hall was originally a pupil of Platt Rogers Spencer. In March 1879 he was teaching writing in Rome, N.Y. In December 1881, he was working at the Business College in Troy, N.Y, and he got a mention in the Penman's Art Journal as having written one of the 'most elegant' letters they'd received that month. Those two things, in the Penman's Art Journal, are all I could find on him.

« Last Edit: November 10, 2015, 09:54:46 AM by Brush My Fennec »

Offline AAAndrew

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #1 on: November 10, 2015, 10:47:18 AM »
Any info on F.S. Heath and/or the Penman's Directory mentioned?

Very enjoyable! Thanks so much for sharing, and congratulations!
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Offline sybillevz

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #2 on: November 10, 2015, 10:49:45 AM »
Very nice ! I like to see that even golden age penmen had their nib skipping from time to time.... 

Offline evjo

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #3 on: November 10, 2015, 10:53:04 AM »
Thank you so much for posting this!
Ev

Offline Ergative

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #4 on: November 10, 2015, 11:42:01 AM »
Very nice ! I like to see that even golden age penmen had their nib skipping from time to time....

Was that skipping? It looked more to me as if he broke each stroke at the baseline, and the next stroke didn't always join up.
Clara

Offline Brush My Fennec

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #5 on: November 10, 2015, 12:28:40 PM »
Any info on F.S. Heath and/or the Penman's Directory mentioned?

I'd completely forgotten to look for that, it's lucky you mentioned it.

I couldn't find anything on the Penman's Directory in the 'Art Journal or the Business Educator unfortunately, but Frederick Heath, described in one issue of the Business Educator as 'the well known expert penman of Concord, N.H', appears many times times in the Penman's art journal and the Business Educator, from the 1890s with the last appearance being in 1918, when he sent in a letter sharing his memories of C.P Zaner, with respect to the awful tragic death of Zaner. Heath usually appeared for sending in high quality examples of ornamental penmanship. He also took out advertisements selling blank cards of all sorts of different colours suitable for ornamental penmanship. Francis B. Courtney endorsed his cards.

A photograph of F.S. Heath is here, on the middle left:

https://archive.org/stream/penmansartjourna29nati#page/8/mode/1up

From 1902, an example of plain practical penmanship from Heath:

https://archive.org/stream/businesseducator08zane#page/n217/mode/1up

In 1907, the Penman's Art Journal ran a course of lessons in Ornamental penmanship by him, one of the pages of which is here:

https://archive.org/stream/penmansartjourna31nati#page/302/mode/2up

Heath also collected and studied oblique pen holders, and wrote an illustrated article on oblique holdersand how different ones affected his writing in different ways, which appears here in a 1914 issue of the 'Educator:

https://archive.org/stream/businesseducator18zane#page/n141/



Offline sybillevz

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #6 on: November 10, 2015, 02:04:33 PM »
Very nice ! I like to see that even golden age penmen had their nib skipping from time to time....

Was that skipping? It looked more to me as if he broke each stroke at the baseline, and the next stroke didn't always join up.

That's what I first thought, but it's not the way spencerian should be written... and it's not done consistently, so I guess it's skipping ?

Offline schin

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #7 on: November 10, 2015, 02:15:03 PM »
Such beautiful work! And yes it seems like he breaks the stroke at the baseline sometimes, like how one would do for engrossers. How interesting! It looks as if he was in a hurry too.
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Offline AAAndrew

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Re: An original piece from 1890 by F. H. Hall, found on ebay
« Reply #8 on: November 10, 2015, 03:23:19 PM »
Any info on F.S. Heath and/or the Penman's Directory mentioned?

I'd completely forgotten to look for that, it's lucky you mentioned it.

...

Thanks! Very interesting. I wonder if Heath, as a "well known expert" in the field, had put together a directory of major Penmen and was selling it. Wouldn't that be an interesting artifact!

And while I'm sure the article on oblique penholders was interesting, I just couldn't stop staring at the opposite page with the amazing certificate from the Ancient Order of Hibernians.  Truly incredible.

Thanks again, Fennec
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