Exhibit of ABC’s: Alphabets from the Zaner-Bloser Collection

The Heritage Room is currently featuring an eye-catching exhibit of Alphabets from the Zaner-Bloser Collection.

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Zaner-Bloser was a leader in penmanship and calligraphy instruction.  The Company produced manuals providing examples of elaborate Roman, Medieval, Decorative, and Shaded or Spencerian alphabets.  The Company also retained the original large format penwork for the manuals and the exhibit will present approximately 70 examples of this original pen artwork.  The exhibit will emphasize the work done by Charles Paxton Zaner (The Zanerian Manual of Alphabets), Daniel Ames (Ames Compendium of Practical and Ornamental Penmanship), Henry Flickinger (Practical Alphabets), and S.C. Malone along with other scribes.

For a sample of some of the alphabets found in our exhibit, please check out our Pinterest Board of Zaner-Bloser Alphabets.

The exhibit opened January 30 and will run through April 5, during normal Library hours.

Please contact Michael Knies Michael.Knies@Scranton.edu 570-941-6341 for more information.

Happy Holidays…Zaner-Bloser Style!

New Year’s flourish, dated 1896, by C. F. Johnston.

It’s December 1st, temperatures are dropping, and the holiday season is in full swing!  Take a (brief) break from working on those final projects and browse a few images of festive holiday themed penmanship from our Zaner-Bloser Penmanship Collection.

Special Collections in the News

The Handwriting on the Wall by Nate Pedersen

The Library’s Special Collections department has been featured in the news twice this summer.

One of last spring’s Schemel Forum courses, The Bible As a Book, taught by Special Collections Librarian Michael Knies, explored the physical development of the Bible from Hebrew Scroll through Victorian Family Bible.  The course was positively reviewed in an article about upcoming Schemel Forum programming in the June issue of the Northeast Pennsylvania Business Journal.

A photograph of the Zaner-Bloser Penmanship Collection exhibit, images from the collection, and information about the collection were included in an article on penmanship titled “The Handwriting on the Wall” by Nate Pedersen in the summer issue of the magazine, Fine Books & Collections.  Pedersen mentions the variety of materials within collection, which includes “examples of astonishing large-form penmanship, handwriting manuals, professional journals, teaching materials for schools, and printing blocks made from original engrossings.”

Zaner-Bloser in the media

Zaner-Bloser penmanship has made it into the media!   Check out the Saturday, January 22, 2011 edition of the Scranton Times-Tribune here:  http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/the-writing-s-on-the-wall-but-no-one-can-read-it-1.1094003#axzz1BmppKM6P.  The print version includes a photograph of our Special Collections Librarian Michael Knies poring over the handwriting samples in the exhibit on the 5th floor of Weinberg Library, in the Heritage Room.  CBS Sunday Morning had a segment this Sunday entitled “A Farewell to Handwriting” and listed as “Signing Off”.  See the video here:   http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7274694n&tag=contentBody;featuredPost-PE

The Zaner-Bloser collection is the newest collection at the University of Scranton’s Weinberg Library.  For additional information about the collection, see:  http://academic.scranton.edu/department/wml/ARCHIVED/features/fall10s-7.html

The  Zaner-Bloser exhibit can be seen now on the 5th floor of the Weinberg Memorial Library in the Heritage Room.  The exhibit formally opens on Wednesday, February 2nd.