My BOSTON LINE fonts were inspired by Boston Line Type, developed in the 1830s by Samuel Gridley Howe (left) for use in raised-letter printing for the blind. The odd diamond-shaped a, d, and o and generous spacing give the inkless, embossed pages a strange beauty. A variety of books were eventually printed with this distinctive type, including a beautiful Bible of 1842. Many blind people found Roman letters difficult to use and all such systems were eventually superseded by Braille. Howe's legacy lives on in Boston's Perkins School for the Blind which he founded.

The compatible PHILADELPHIA LINE fonts were inspired by another raised-print font, this one developed by Julius Friedlander (left) and adopted in 1837 by his Philadelphia school, now the Overbrook School for the Blind.

	Similarities between the two styles include the peculiar form of certain characters (b, e, k, u) and the avoidance of descenders (j,p,y). Differences include Philadelphia's separate upper and lower cases and its conventional round a, d, h, m, and n. I've also made Alternate fonts with conventional descending j, p, q and y, and a Bold version of each.
	The 4 BOSTON fonts include lowercase, punctuation, numbers, and international characters. The 4 PHILADELPHIA fonts include upper- and lowercase, punctuation, numbers, and international characters.
	Download and try out the Boston Line demo. If you like it, send me $5 for the full set of 8 complete fonts in your choice of TrueType or Type 1 for Windows or for Mac. Download demo for Mac | Download demo for Windows

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More information:

• See also my Valentin font, inspired by Haüy's 18th-century French raised print for the blind.
• My assumption is that Boston Line Type was so named because the letters all rest on the base line (no descenders).
• Lacking its original name, I've called the second font set Philadelphia Line, following the Boston font. There is much less information available about this style, which was edged out by Boston Line Type at the London World Exposition of 1851.
• For missing characters, I have borrowed them from the Boston font. I welcome additional information about either system.
• You can read more about the subject in the Catholic Encyclopedia, at HistoryBuff.com, and at the Perkins Museum.
• The Boston Line Type example above is from a Bible "Executed for the American Bible Society, under the direction of S. G. Howe, at the institution for the blind. Boston S.P Ruggles, artist 1842"
• The Philadelphia example is from the fly leaf (separately printed by "N.B. Kneass, Jr., Printer, Phil'a.") of an otherwise conventional book, Beauties and Achievements of the Blind by Wm. Ardman, printed in 1892 by B.[?] R. Andrews of Rochester, NY.
• I have spaced my f onts tighter than the original examples. You can spread them out for a more authentic look.