CBS News & Charles Kuralt – The Incredible Year album art
Contributed by Garrison Martin
on Mar 4th, 2024. Artwork published in
.
Source: archive.org License: All Rights Reserved.
A news report narrated by Charles Kuralt on the year 1968 by CBS News. CBS News commonly released a vinyl album at each year’s end from the 1950s to the 70s, summing up news from the year.
The title on the front is set in the custom typeface commissioned from Freeman Craw, CBS Didot. Text on the back cover combines it with Monotype Bodoni and News Gothic [edit: rather Trade Gothic, see comments].
Source: archive.org License: All Rights Reserved.
Source: www.amazon.com License: All Rights Reserved.
2 Comments on “CBS News & Charles Kuralt – The Incredible Year album art”
A few observations:
— CBS Didot’s shape as we know it dated to the early 1950s. It was also seen on a couple of RCA Victor LPs of the time (such as the original release of “Como’s Golden Records”), as well as the animated CBS eye which operated like a camera shutter, and the marquee of CBS’s Studio 72 on Broadway and 81st Street. But it firmly took off in 1962 under Lou Dorfsman’s aegis, for sure.
— What is passed off as News Gothic was actually Trade Gothic Light with Italic. Light and Regular were Linotype approximations of News Gothic.
Thanks, W.B.!
As for CBS Didot: you are right that cover for Como’s Golden Records from 1954 uses letterforms that seem to be a match. I also noticed that several other Didots that were available from Photo-Lettering come very close as well. Are you certain that it’s CBS’s custom typeface in use on that cover?
See also this other post (with comments) that is concerned with CBS Didot and its history. Maybe you can chime in there as well.
Regarding Trade Gothic: good point, adjusted!