Died 1972 Alma mater Manchester University | Nationality British Name Alfred Johnson | |
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Occupation Author, Typographer, Academic Librarian | ||
Alfred Forbes Johnson, MC (November 1884 – 27 March 1972) was an English academic librarian, bibliographer, curator, and expert in typography. He was Deputy Keeper of Printed Books at the British Museum. He is author of many bibliographical reference works, and the standard Encyclopaedia of Typefaces.
Biography
Johnson was born in Nottingham in 1884, to John and Ellen Angeline Johnson, nee Beilby. He was educated at Nottingham Grammar School and read Classics at the University of Manchester, where he took a first-class degree, played for the university football team, and met his wife, Sarah Elizabeth Jackson. He began working at the British Museum in 1906, joining the Department of Printed Books, which eventually became the British Library, where he was a pioneer in sixteenth-century French and Italian bibliography and printers' type faces.
In World War I he joined the Artists Rifles and was commissioned from there as a lieutenant in the artillery. He saw action in France, where he was awarded the Military Cross for gallantry. After the war he returned to the British Museum, where he became Deputy Keeper of Printed Books while producing many books and monographs on typographical subjects. In 1956 he was awarded the Bibliographical Society’s gold medal for distinguished services to bibliography, and he was president of the society from 1975 to 1977.
Johnson made a major contribution towards the dating and attribution of early printed books from their typography which led him to a wider interest in typefaces and design. This culminated in the publication of The Encyclopaedia of Typefaces, produced in collaboration with W Turner Berry and W P Jaspert in 1953. The Encyclopaedia has been through 11 editions and has become "the leading guide to typefaces".