Joseph Blumenthal was an American printer, teacher, and designer of books and printing types. After working in the printing industry for some time, Blumenthal and A. G. Hoffman of the Marchbank Press founded the Spiral Press in 1926. Due to the economic depression

Depression (economics)

In economics, a depression is a sustained, long-term downturn in economic activity in one or more economies. It is a more severe downturn than a recession, which is seen by some economists as part of the modern business cycle....

, Blumenthal suspended operation of the press in 1930 and took an extended trip to Europe where he designed the typeface Spiral whose punches were hand-cut by Louis Hoell Returning from Europe a few years later, Blumenthal re-opened the Spiral Press, which he ran until 1971. After retiring from printing, he wrote and organized expositions.

Typefaces

• Spiral (1930, Bauer
  Bauer Type Foundry
  The Bauer Type Foundry was a German type foundry founded in 1837 by Johann Christian Bauer in Frankfurt am Main. Noted typeface designers, among them Lucian Bernhard, Konrad Friedrich Bauer , Walter Baum, Heinrich Jost, Imre Reiner, Friedrich Hermann Ernst Schneidler, Emil Rudolf Weiß, and Heinrich...
  
  )
• Emerson
  Emerson (typeface)
  Emerson is a typeface designed by Joseph Blumenthal. In 1930, the type was cut by Louis Hoell at the Bauer Type Foundry in Frankfurt and named Spiral. Then in 1935, Stanley Morison recut the type, along with its italic, for the Monotype Corporation in England...
  
   (1936, English Monotype
  Monotype Corporation
  Monotype Imaging Holdings is a Delaware corporation based in Woburn, Massachusetts and specializing in typesetting and typeface design as well as text and imaging solutions for use with consumer electronics devices. Monotype Imaging Holdings is the owner of Monotype Imaging Inc., Linotype,...
  
  )
• Emerson Italic
  Emerson (typeface)
  Emerson is a typeface designed by Joseph Blumenthal. In 1930, the type was cut by Louis Hoell at the Bauer Type Foundry in Frankfurt and named Spiral. Then in 1935, Stanley Morison recut the type, along with its italic, for the Monotype Corporation in England...
  
   (1936, English Monotype
  Monotype Corporation
  Monotype Imaging Holdings is a Delaware corporation based in Woburn, Massachusetts and specializing in typesetting and typeface design as well as text and imaging solutions for use with consumer electronics devices. Monotype Imaging Holdings is the owner of Monotype Imaging Inc., Linotype,...
  
  )

Publications

• "Art of the Printed Book," New York, 1973
• "Typographic Years, a Printer's Journey Through Half a Century 1925 - 1975," New York, 1982