1992.314.14a-e

Boston Line Letter embossing plates

5 plates, Boston Line Letter Vocabulary; produced from hand set type pressed into foil and mounted on a sheet of tinplate; (a) first six lines, "let" to "had", second six lines, "old" to "put"; (b) first six lines, "act" to "Ben", second six lines, "big" to "can"; (c) first six lines, "dig" to "far", second six lines, "for" to "how"; (d) all words different, twelve lines, begins with "this" and ends with "hull"; (e) first six lines, "am" to "my", second six lines, "no" to "aim".

H-10.5 W-10.375 inches

ca. 1890

American Printing House for the Blind

Louisville, KY

1885 Annual Report: "The unique method of stereotyping, by which is secured a flexible stereotype plate, made of tin foil, amalgamated to a sheet of ordinary roofing tin, is the quickest, and cheapest, and for embossing work the best method in use. The double-cylinder press, made from special designs, prints four pages at every revolution, and will make thirty or more revolutions a minute. The flexible plates adapt themselves to the cylinders without any planing, and the character of the embossing speaks for itself."
Boston Line Letter was developed by Samuel Gridley Howe at the Perkins Institute in 1835. It was the dominant tactile alphabet in America for over 50 years and continued to be carried by APH into the 1920s.

APH Collection, 1992.314