U.K. and U.S. Job Cases

    
                     
             
   
             
   
           
   
Although the first typecases were single large cases, which held the whole fount of characters, these soon became divided into two separate upper and lower cases, in the non Germanic countries. This allowed the accents, small capitals, etc to be stored conveniently in the cases, as well as making the individual cases lighter to handle, since they were smaller in size.
               
              
              
              
              
              
              
However, newspaper and jobbing (ie not book) work did not require the full range of accents, fractions, etc., and a case was developed that combined a lower case, and half an upper case, to make the double, or job, case. Confusingly, it was also sometimes referred to as a half case, but this term is more correctly used to describe a half-size case. The double case is physically the same size as a standard upper or lower case, although the overall size of the Double and Job cases is slightly different between England and Scotland and U.S.A., and there is a significant difference in the central lower case bay in the box above the i box. English cases have one single box here, for spacing, whilst U.S. cases have a divided box, for the start of the numerals, as shown in the case below. (Scottish cases have the divided box above the i box, but the box layout for most of the minor characters is different.)
For further information on the different configuration of cases, choose either U.S. Job or English Double, or Scottish Double. Or choose a comparison of just the three styles of California Job case.

For a summary of the different contents of the boxes, choose English Double or Variations in Double Lays.
                          
                   
           
                     
         
                   
           
 

Empty cases
ie with the boxes left blank
Type layouts
ie with characters assigned to boxes
Full Index of layoutsGlossary of terms usedSources of the layoutsIntroduction
Quantities in a Fount of typeQuantities in a Case of type
This pageNotes about Upper casesNotes about Lower casesAlembic home page

This page was written by David Bolton and last updated 30 May 2015.