Alfred John Fairbank

CBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(12 July 1895 – 14 March 1982) was a British

calligrapher Calligraphy (from el, link=y, καλλιγραφία) is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instrument. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as "t ...

palaeographer Palaeography ( UK) or paleography ( US; ultimately from grc-gre, , ''palaiós'', "old", and , ''gráphein'', "to write") is the study of historic writing systems and the deciphering and dating of historical manuscripts, including the analysi ...

and author on handwriting. Fairbank was a founding member of the Society of Scribes and Illuminators in 1921, and later became its honourable secretary. He was involved in the foundation of the Society for Italic Handwriting in 1952; his work and 1932 textbook ''A Handwriting Manual'' were influential on the

italic script Italic script, also known as chancery cursive and Italic hand, is a semi-cursive, slightly sloped style of handwriting and calligraphy that was developed during the Renaissance in Italy. It is one of the most popular styles used in contemporary ...

handwriting taught in British schools. His portrait was painted by Anna Hornby. For

Penguin Books Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year. Fairbank was a civil servant who spent his professional career working at the Admiralty in London and Bath; he retired to

Hove Hove is a seaside resort and one of the two main parts of the city of Brighton and Hove, along with Brighton in East Sussex, England. Originally a "small but ancient fishing village" surrounded by open farmland, it grew rapidly in the 19th c ...

on the south coast and lectured at what is now the

University of Brighton The University of Brighton is a public university based on four campuses in Brighton and Eastbourne on the south coast of England. Its roots can be traced back to 1858 when the Brighton School of Art was opened in the Royal Pavilion. It achiev ...

after his retirement. Fragments from medieval manuscripts collected by Alfred Fairbank are located at the Cadbury Research Library, University of Birmingham.

Early life

Alfred John Fairbank was born in

Grimsby Grimsby or Great Grimsby is a port town and the administrative centre of North East Lincolnshire, Lincolnshire, England. Grimsby adjoins the town of Cleethorpes directly to the south-east forming a conurbation. Grimsby is north-east of L ...

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-we ...

on the 12th July 1895, to his father of the same name; Alfred John Fairbank and his mother Emma Fairbank, née Greetham, he had a half sister Elsie Kneeshaw. He married in 1919 and had a daughter Milfred Nolly Fairbank in 1922 in Bromley Kent but she died in the same year. Fairbank studied at the

Central School of Art and Design The Central School of Art and Design was a public school of fine and applied arts in London, England. It offered foundation and degree level courses. It was established in 1896 by the London County Council as the Central School of Arts and ...

where in 1920 he attended evening classes in lettering and illuminating under Graily Hewitt, who in turn had been taught at the same institute by

Edward Johnston Edward Johnston, CBE (11 February 1872 – 26 November 1944) was a British craftsman who is regarded, with Rudolf Koch, as the father of modern calligraphy, in the particular form of the broad-edged pen as a writing tool. He is most fa ...

, Fairbank would later describe himself as a 'disciple' of Johnston. Johnston and his student Hewitt were the preeminent revivalists of calligraphy at the turn of the century and clearly influenced Fairbank.

Career

Principal professional career: * 1920–1955 – Civil servant at the

Admiralty Admiralty most often refers to: *Admiralty, Hong Kong *Admiralty (United Kingdom), military department in command of the Royal Navy from 1707 to 1964 *The rank of admiral *Admiralty law Admiralty can also refer to: Buildings * Admiralty, Traf ...

, based in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

or Bath, until civil service retirement age of 60. * 1955–1966 – Lecturer and adviser at

Brighton College of Art Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...

Despite being an Admiralty civil servant for the majority of his career, Fairbank prodigiously created acclaimed artistic works of calligraphy and scholarly works of palaeography as catalogued below.

Italic handwriting

Fairbank's greatest achievement was the revival of a general hand-writing style known as

Italic Script Italic script, also known as chancery cursive and Italic hand, is a semi-cursive, slightly sloped style of handwriting and calligraphy that was developed during the Renaissance in Italy. It is one of the most popular styles used in contemporary ...

which was invented in

renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

and used extensively by the Vatican bureaucracy. The style was described by writings from the era by Arrighi in his 1522 pamphlet ''La Operina,'' where he described a sub-style which became known as

Chancery Hand The term "chancery hand" can refer to either of two distinct styles of historical handwriting. A chancery hand was at first a form of handwriting for business transactions that developed in the Lateran chancery (the ) of the 13th century, t ...

, then shortly afterwards in 1538 by

Palatino Palatino is the name of an old-style serif typeface designed by Hermann Zapf, initially released in 1949 by the Stempel foundry and later by other companies, most notably the Mergenthaler Linotype Company. Named after the 16th-century Italian ...

in his treatise on calligraphy, ''Libro nuovo d'imparare a scrivere.'' Examples of other master scribes from the era were: - Bartolmeo San Vito, Antonio Tophio & Bartolomeo Fonzio. Fairbanks studied this style in his Palaeographical scholarly work and practiced it through his calligraphy, he realised the significant improvements this style had on previous hand-writing scripts and indeed on modern scripts in terms such as clarity, beauty and speed of writing. So he began to strongly advocate for its revival, but unlike the mainly artistic revival work of his mentors Johnston and Hewitt, Fairbank proposed that the hand was universally taught at schools. To this end, Fairbank produced educational works which were used in schools, A Handwriting Manual (1932) and the Beacon Writing Books (1959), written in conjunction with educationists.

Typography

In 1928, Fairbank designed an upright italic

typeface A typeface (or font family) is the design of lettering that can include variations in size, weight (e.g. bold), slope (e.g. italic), width (e.g. condensed), and so on. Each of these variations of the typeface is a font. There are thousands o ...

for

Monotype Monotyping is a type of printmaking made by drawing or painting on a smooth, non-absorbent surface. The surface, or matrix, was historically a copper etching plate, but in contemporary work it can vary from zinc or glass to acrylic glass. The ...

. Monotype chose to incorporate this within their Bembo family of typefaces despite the fact Fairbank had designed a very unique typeface out of quilter with the general Bembo ethos, this irritated Fairbank, who thought it should have been an independent design. When Monotype digitised in 2004, they rectified this and recognised the uniqueness of Fairbank's work by both expanding and improving the typeface and marketing as Fairbank'''. Fairbank's original 1928 typeface was limited to the composition caster in metal type, only available in 4 sizes: 10, 12, 13 and 16pt (for large composition), the typeface was named "Bembo Condensed Italic", Monotype series 294. Fairbank made clear why he was a calligrapher first and why he created so little typography:

I believe in the importance of the unique work, of things made for particular purposes. I claim the superiority of actual script over reproduced copies, on the same grounds as one believes in the painting more than in its reproduction, or the playing of an orchestra rather than the gramophone record. The reproduced work is expedient, although valuable for its service and essential for commerce. Handwriting is not done for reproduction, unless it is expedient, and it is not often that.

New alphabets

English orthography English orthography is the writing system used to represent spoken English, allowing readers to connect the graphemes to sound and to meaning. It includes English's norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalisation, word breaks, emphasis, and ...

is phonetically irregular, causing difficulty for children to learn to read; the mid-20th century was an unusual time when several attempts were made to address this issue, and in each case the proponents for change turned to Fairbank for the necessary calligraphy. * In 1930,

Robert Bridges Robert Seymour Bridges (23 October 1844 – 21 April 1930) was an English poet who was Poet Laureate from 1913 to 1930. A doctor by training, he achieved literary fame only late in life. His poems reflect a deep Christian faith, and he is ...

, the

poet laureate A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch ...

, asked Fairbank to design a new letter and afterwards they spoke about another more ambitious project for a new phonetic alphabet based on Roman type but this was ended by Bridges' death a short time later. * In 1953, Fairbank successfully produced the calligraphic design for Sir James Pitman's new

initial teaching alphabet The Initial Teaching Alphabet (I.T.A. or i.t.a.) is a variant of the Latin alphabet developed by Sir James Pitman (the grandson of Sir Isaac Pitman, inventor of a system of shorthand) in the early 1960s. It was not intended to be a strictly phone ...

. The remit for the

alphabet An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a syllab ...

was challenging, in that the cursive handwriting of the new alphabet had to be designed first then the typeface designed to mirror match so children saw exactly the same in both hand-written cursive form and printed form. This was an ideal challenge for Fairbank whose works on italic hand-writing had put him in good stead for hand-writing design and the large-scale studies which followed the implementation of the initial teaching alphabet proved how children's writing substantially improved when they used the initial teaching alphabet. The Monotype Corporation transliterated Fairbank's calligraphy onto a new version of their Ehrhardt typeface.

Learned societies

* In 1921, the early students of

, including Alfred Fairbank, formed the Society of Scribes and Illuminators whose aims include the encouragement and practice of calligraphy and fine lettering. From being a founding member, Fairbank served as the honourable secretary between 1931 and 1934 which was the highest office of the Society at the time. * In 1952, as the Society of Scribes and Illuminators was receiving so many enquiries about italic handwriting, it was decided to set up a separate Society for Italic Handwriting, whose aim was the revival then encouragement and promotion of the hand. Fairbank was the modern proponent of Italic Handwriting through his penmanship notes in the Society for Pure English - Tract XXVIII 'English Handwriting', which he later expanded upon in his Handwriting Manual of 1932. Consequently, Fairbank jointly founded the new society with Joseph Compton CBE (director of Education in London), who served as the inaugural chairman, Fairbank eventually became the third chairman (1973 - 1975). * In 1977, Fairbank acquiesced to a request by the newly formed Victoria Society of Calligraphy and Italic Handwriting (in Canada) to honour his name by renaming the Society to the Fairbank Calligraphy Society.

Manuscript books

* 1921-2, 17 Rolls of Honour of L.C.C. Schools, made under the direction of Lawrence Christie * 1922, ''The Bull'', by

Ralph Hodgson Ralph Hodgson (9 September 1871 – 3 November 1962), Order of the Rising Sun (Japanese 旭日章), was an English poet, very popular in his lifetime on the strength of a small number of anthology pieces, such as ''The Bull''. He was one of th ...

, Paper, bought by Edwin J. Evans * 1922, ''Winter Nghtfall'', by J.C. Squire,

parchment Parchment is a writing material made from specially prepared untanned skins of animals—primarily sheep, calves, and goats. It has been used as a writing medium for over two millennia. Vellum is a finer quality parchment made from the skins o ...

* 1922, Marriage Service, Parchment, Illuminated by Mary H. Robinson * 1923, ''Eye & Other Poems'', by Ralph Hodson, paper * 1923, ''Poems'', by W. H. Davies, paper * 1923, Eight Poems by R. L. Stevenson, parchment * 1923, ''Biggleswade Book of Remembrance'', parchment, illuminated by Lawrence Christie * 1924, ''The XII Months'', parchment, drawings by Lawrence Christie. (two copes, one purchased by

Ambrose Heal Sir Ambrose Heal (3 September 1872 – 15 November 1959) was an English furniture designer and businessman in the first half of the 20th century. He served as the chairman of Heal's (then called Heal & Son) from 1913 to 1953. Early life Hea ...

) * 1924, ''Thoughts in a Garden'', by

Andrew Marvell Andrew Marvell (; 31 March 1621 – 16 August 1678) was an English metaphysical poet, satirist and politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1659 and 1678. During the Commonwealth period he was a colleague and friend ...

, parchment, illuminated by Marta Bowerley, bought by

* 1925, ''Three Poems'', parchment, commissioned by G.B. Clothier * 1925, ''Sirena'', by

Michael Drayton Michael Drayton (1563 – 23 December 1631) was an English poet who came to prominence in the Elizabethan era. He died on 23 December 1631 in London. Early life Drayton was born at Hartshill, near Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England. Almost nothin ...

, parchment * 1926, ''Comus'', by John Milton, paper, illuminated by Louise Powell, in possession of Leonard Schlosser, New York * 1926, Deed of Gift of Branze Bust of Wm. Archer. Written for the British Drama League * 1926-9, ''Ecclesiasticus'', parchment, illuminated by Louise Powell, commissioned by A.D. Power, who edited it,

Fitzwilliam Museum The Fitzwilliam Museum is the art and antiquities museum of the University of Cambridge. It is located on Trumpington Street opposite Fitzwilliam Street in central Cambridge. It was founded in 1816 under the will of Richard FitzWilliam, 7th Vis ...

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...

* 1926, ''The book of Ruth'', paper, in possession of Miss Catharine Powell * 1926, 25 sonnets of Shakespeare, paper, illuminated by Louis Powell, commissioned by Edwin J. Evans * 1926-7, 24 Manuscript Copy-books of the Italic Hand, one in the Pierpont Morgan Library * 1927-32, ''The Odes'' and ''Epodes'' of Horace,

vellum Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. Parchment is another term for this material, from which vellum is sometimes distinguished, when it is made from calfskin, as opposed to that made from other anima ...

, illuminated by Louise Powell, commissioned by Edwin J. Evans * 1931, ''Aesop & Rhodope'', by Savage Landor, paper, presented to

* 1931, ''Lines on the Euganean Hills'', by Savage Landor, paper, illuminated by Louise Powell, in possession of Philip Hofer * 1932, ''Sampler book of Sonnets, written in five italic hands'', paper, commissioned by the

Dryad Press Dryad Press is an American small press and publisher. History Dryad Press got its beginning in 1967 when Merrill Leffler and Neil Lehrman founded ''Dryad'' magazine. Leffler was a writer and editor and is currently the poet laureate of Takoma P ...

, Leicester * 1932, Twelve Poems, vellum, commissioned by H.H. Peach * 1932-8, the ''Eclogues'' and ''Georgics'' of Virgil, vellum, illuminated by Louise Powell, commissioned by St John Hornby * 1939, ''Book of Names'', presented to Tom Jones C.H.. decorated by Berthold L. Wolpe * 1949, Speeches on unveiling of memorial to President F. D. Roosevelt, in

Westminster Abbey Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the Unite ...

, vellum, presented by the Prime Minister to Mrs. Roosevelt

Publications

* ''Society of Pure English - Tract No XXVIII English Handwriting Continued from Tract XXIII with Thirty-one Additional Plates'', Alfred Fairbank, Edited By Robert Seymour Bridges (1844–1930) with Notes on penmanship, At the Clarendon Press Oxford University Press 1927, P. 23251, 35–65 pages. fasc, * ''A Handwriting Manual'', Leicester, The Dryad Press, 1932 ** revised editions 1947 & 1948: The Dryad Press, Leicester, printed at the Curwen Press, Plaistow, E.13, ** third edition: revised and enlarged, 1961: London, Faber and Faber, 95 p., 2p. pl, ** Faber & Faber Ltd, new & enlarged edition, 1954, 5th edition 1956, revised & enlarged edition 1961, paperback edition 1965 ** Ninth edition, 1975: Watson-Guptill Publications, New York, with additional illustrations of demonstration scripts mainly from American sources * ''Woodside Writing cards'', 1932, Dryad Press, Leicester * ''Dryad Lettering Card No. 2'', 1932, Dryad Press, Leicester * ''The Dryad Cards'', Originally issued in 1935 as: ''The Barking Writing Cards''. publisher: The Dryad Press, Leicester. * ''Lettering Of To-Day'', C.G. Holme; Eberhard Holscher, Alfred Fairbank, Anna Simons, Percy J. Smith, and R. Haughton James, Studio 1937 * ''A book of scripts'', 1949, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, The King Penguin Books nr. 48, 64 p, ill., facs, * ''Augustino Da Siena, the 1568 Edition of His Writing Book in Facsimile'', Alfred Fairbank, publisher: David Godine, Boston, 1975. limited edition of 750 copies * ''BEACON WRITING: A Course in Italic Set of 6'', Alfred Fairbank, publisher: Ginn & Company LTD, London, 1958 * ''Humanistic script of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries'', Alfred John Fairbank & Richard William Hunt (1908–1979), Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodleian picture books nr. 12, 8 p., 24 p. facs. * ''Renaissance Handwriting: An Anthology of Italic Scripts'', Alfred Fairbank & Berthold L. Wolpe (1905–1989), publishers: The World Publishing Company & Faber & Faber, London, 1960, 104, 96 p, facs, * ''The Italic Hand in Tudor Cambridge: Forty-one Examples'', Alfred Fairbank & Bruce Dickins. publisher: Bowes & Bowes, London, 1962, Monograph / Cambridge Bibliographical Society no. 5, VIII, 32 p., 24 p. pl, facs. * ''How to Teach the Italic Hand Through the Beacon Writing Books'', Alfred Fairbank, Ginn 1963 * ''Calligraphy and Palaeography'', essays presented to Alfred Fairbank on his 70th birthday, ed. by A.S. Osley, publisher: Faber & Faber, London, 1965, with index. XXIII, 286 p, illustrations, * ''Lettering – Modes of Writing in Western Europe from Antiquity to the Eighteenth Century'', Hermann Degering with preface By Alfred Fairbank, Ernest Benn Ltd., London 1965 & Pentalic Corporation, N Y, 1965 * ''The Story of Handwriting: Origins and Development'', Alfred Fairbank, Faber & Faber 1970

Articles

* ''Notes on Penmanship'' (reproduced in facsimile), Society for Pure English Tract no. XXVIII: ''English Handwriting'', edited by

, 1927 * ''Calligraphy and the Manuscript Book'', ''London Mercury'', May, 1930 * ''Edward Johnston und die englische Kalligraphie'', ''Schrift und Schreiben'' December 1931 * ''Italic Handwriting'', ''The Dryad Quarterly'', April 1932 * ''The Teaching of Handwriting: A Suggested Reform'', ''Journal of the RoyalSociety of Arts'', 16 December 1932 * ''Writing Reform'', ''The Teachers World'', 11 January 1933 * ''English Calligraphy and Illuminating'', ''Die Zeitgemasse Schrift'', no. 32, January 1935, * ''Calligraphy'', ''Lettering of Today'', Studio Ltd. 1937, 1941, 1945, 1949, Edited by C.G. Holme * ''Handwriting Reform'', ''Typography'', 4, Autumn 1937, repeated in: ''P.M. Journal'' U.S.A. December–January 1938-9 * ''On Writing `Fair','' ''Tribute to Walter de la Mare on his Saventy-fifth Birthday'', Faber & Faber Ltd. 1948 * ''Tribute IV'', ''Tributes to Edward Johnston Calligrapher'', Maidstone School of Art, 1948 * ''Handwriting Reform in England'', ''Schweizer Graphische Mitteilungen'', August 1948, Repeated in: ''Printing Review'', Spring 1950 * ''Italic Handwriting'', ''Journal of the Royal Society of Arts'', 19 October 1951 * ''With Pen in Hand'', ''Children's Newspaper'', 26 January 1952 * ''Handwriting'', ''Manchester Evening Chronicle'', 26 November 1952 * ''This is Everyman's Handicraft'', ''Christiaan Science Monitor'', 9 March 1951 * ''Take Pen and Write'', ''Venture: Journal of the Civil Service Council for Further Education'', September 1953 * ''A Graceful Cure for the Common Scrawl: A Fair Italic Hand'', ''London Illustrated News'', 12 March 1955 * ''Cursive Handwriting'', ''The Calligraphers Handbook'', Faber & Faber Ltd., edited by: C.M. Lamb * ''Die Cancellaresca in Handschrift und Drucktype: Die Schreibücher von Arrighi, Tagliente und Palentino'', ''Imprimatur'' 1956/7, Edited by: Siegfried Bunchenau und Dr. Georg Kurt Schauer * ''Italic Handwriting'', ''The Schoolmaster'', October/November 1960 * ''Morris and Calligraphy'', ''The Journal of the William Morris Society'', Winter 1961 * ''Bartholomew Dodington: Elizabethan Scholar and Penman'', ''Motif'' 9, Summer 1962, edited by:

Ruari McLean John David Ruari McLean CBE, DSC (10 June 1917 – 27 March 2006) was a leading British typographic designer. Early life and apprenticeship Ruari McLean was born in Scotland on 10 June 1917, in Newton Stewart, Galloway. He was educated at th ...

* ''Looking at Letters and Words'', ''Studies in Honor of Berthold Louis Ullman'', Volume II, ''Editioni di Storia e Letteratura'' 1964, edited by: Charles Henderson Jr. * ''Italic in its Own Right'', ''Alphabet 1964'', edited by: R.S. Hutchings

Short articles in the ''Bulletin & Journal of the Society for Italic Handwriting''

* ''A note on Speed'', ''Bulletin'' 3, summer 1955 * ''The Recent History of Italic Handwriting'', ''Bulletin'' 6, spring 1956''Calligraphy and Paleography'', essays presented to Alfred Fairbank on his seventienth birthday, edited by A.S. Osley, Faber & Faber ltd, 1965, p.25 * ''A System of Movements'', ''Bulletin'' 13, winter 1957-8 * ''Some Renaissance Manuscripts'', ''Bulletin'' 15, summer 1958 * ''Ascenders in Writing Models'', ''Bulletin'' 17, winter 1958-9 * ''Nomenclatur'', ''Bulletin'' 18, spring 1959 * ''Bartholomew Dodington'', ''Bulletin'' 19, summer 1959 * ''Let Reason Go before Enterprise'', ''Bulletin'' 21, winter 1959-60 * ''The Mystic Art'', ''Bulletin'' 21, winter 1959-60 * ''A Writing Lesson'', ''Bulletin'' 24, autumn 1960 * ''More about Arrighi'', ''Bulletin'' 26, spring 1961 * ''Bartolomeo San Vito'', ''Bulletin'' 28, autumn 1961 * ''Three Renessance Scripts'', ''Journal'' 32, autumn 1962 * ''The Script of Pietro Cennini'', ''Journal'' 33, winter 1962 * ''Condensed Bembo Italic'', ''Journal'' 33, winter 1962 * ''The Arrighi Style of Book Hand'', ''Journal'' 35, summer 1963 * ''Scripts of Papal Briefs'', ''Journal'' 36, autumn 1963 * ''Italic at Brighton'', ''Journal'' 39, summer 1964 * ''What makes a Good Style?'', ''Journal'' 42, spring 1965 * ''More of Sna Vito'', ''Journal'' 42, spring 1965 * ''A Ten-hour Manuscript'', ''Journal'' 43, summer 1965 * ''Simple Geometric Aspects of Italic'', ''Journal'' 44, autumn 1965

References

External links

Fairbank Calligraphy Society
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fairbank, Alfred 1895 births 1982 deaths British calligraphers British civil servants People from Grimsby