Ernst F. Detterer papers

Collection

Identifier: Wing-Modern-MS-Dett

Staff Only

Scope and Content of the Collection

Largely materials that derive from Ernst Detterer’s career as a teacher at the Chicago Normal School and at the School of the Art Institute before he came to work at the Newberry Library in 1931.

These include course notes, and handouts, sketches and drawings, preliminaries for calligraphic pieces, and finished work by students. There are also notes and sketches from his travels in Great Britain and Europe, and a few pieces from his student days at the Philadelphia School of Industrial Art. A few correspondence files concern the assembly of materials by gifts from former students James Hayes and Robert Hunter Middleton. There is also a roll of rubbings of Trajan’s Column in Rome made by Detterer in the 1920s.

Dates

Creation: 1897-1968
Creation: Majority of material found within 1917 - 1931

Creator

Detterer, Ernst Frederick, 1888-1947 (Person)

Language

Materials are mostly in English.

Conditions Governing Access

The Ernst F. Detterer papers are open for research in the Special Collections Reading Room; 1 box at a time (Priority III).

Ownership and Literary Rights

The Ernst F. Detterer papers are the physical property of the Newberry Library. Copyright may belong to the authors or their legal heirs or assigns. For permission to publish or reproduce any materials from this collection, contact the Roger and Julie Baskes Department of Special Collections.

Biography of Ernst F. Detterer

Chicago designer, lettering artist, teacher and curator.

Ernst Frederick Detterer was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in 1888, son of a Moravian Church minister. He was educated at the Chautauqua Institution and the Philadelphia School of Industrial Art. He took a few transformative lessons in handwriting from English calligrapher Edward Johnston in 1913, and became one of the principal proponents of Johnstonian handwriting instruction in the United States. As professor of handwriting at the Chicago Normal School from 1912 to 1918 and head of the Department of Printing Arts at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1918-1931), he mentored an entire generation of lettering artists and printers in the Midwest. From 1931 until his death in 1947, he served as the second Custodian of the John M. Wing Foundation on the History of Printing at the Newberry Library. In this role he extended the Wing collection to include many calligraphic manuscripts and books (most importantly through the acquisition of parts of the Coella Lindsay Ricketts collection). He was a founding member of the Society of Typographic arts and instituted an STA Calligraphy Study Group at the Newberry, which continued after his death under the leadership of his SAIC student James Hayes. Together with another of his SAIC students, R. Hunter Middleton, he designed the Eusebius typeface marketed by the Ludlow Typograph Co. of Chicago

Extent

16.3 Linear Feet (7 boxes, 3 oversize boxes, 1 framed item, and 1 roll)

Additional Description

Abstract

Chicago designer and calligrapher, founding head of the Department of Printing Arts of the School of the Art Institute, and Custodian of the John M. Wing Foundation on the History of Printing at the Newberry Library, 1931-1947. Collection focuses on Detterer's career before he came to the Newberry Library, and includes notes, memorabilia, correspondence, drawings, sketches, rubbings, and a few finished art works, including many by his Art Institute students.

Organization

Papers are organized in the following series

Series 1: Biographical information, 1942-1968: Box 1
Series 2: Philadelphia School of Industrial Art, approximately 1910: Box 1
Series 3: Chicago Normal School, 1912-1918: Box 1
Series 4: School of the Art Institute, 1918-1931: Boxes 2-3
Series 5: Miscellaneous, undated, 1897-1932: Boxes 4-7
Series 6: Oversize materials, 1914-1947: Boxes 8-10; framed and rolled items