# The period on signs in the 1800s **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 20, 2010, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810 "2010-08-20T01:18:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/21 "2010-08-21T00:56:36Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > > [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > > > …and you always will. You poor thing. > > > > I think there should be a warning akin to linking to TVTropes or PDFs when someone defines of kerning. Spoiler box at the least. We’ve lost too many great people to asylums over the years. > > For several years, I did kerning full-time for a type manufacturer. You know, when you set type to “metrics” or “optical,” someone has to sit there and actually make those decisions for every character pair in a font. > > After a while you find yourself kerning a row of cars or trees. And yes, I wish I could totally destroy that part of my brain. I worked on an early digital font system. The kerning tables were calculated in units as low as 1% of the character widths. We ended up throwing out most of the values because they were too small to represent at the available resolution, and rounded all the rest until we had small table that represented all the combinations that could be kerned by at least 1 pixel on the display. But we knew someone had put that original data together the hard way. And we felt really sorry for you. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/22 "2010-08-21T01:40:12Z")
I have a theory that the period was to tell people to stop reading. Reading was by no means a universal skill back in the day. People may well have needed help to know when to stop looking for intelligible characters, and not just keep trying to read windows, stray dogs, water pumps or footprints in the dirt. ---
**Author:** ![Celyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9dc877/32.png) [@Celyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Celyn)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/23 "2010-08-21T02:49:36Z")
But I think it might be fun to read stray dogs. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/24 "2010-08-21T02:59:19Z")
I’m feeling rather stupid right now…where is the word “Always” in this picture? 😕 And damn you, **Burns** , for linking to Shorpy. I will now spend way too much time looking through it! ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/25 "2010-08-21T03:20:18Z")
I was told—no source, alas—that the full stop was a way of adding emphasis: a bit like underlining. I believe the _Wall Street Journal_ still has a full stop at the end of its front-page flag. And as long as we’re telling typesetting stories, I knew I’d been setting and proofreading type too long the day I tried to dial the hyphen in a phone number. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/26 "2010-08-21T05:44:30Z")
> [@mnemosyne](#): > > I’m feeling rather stupid right now…where is the word “Always” in this picture? 😕 It’s not in the picture, it’s in the title banner of the web page. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/27 "2010-08-21T14:31:02Z")
> [@jackdavinci](#): > > > [@mnemosyne](#): > > > > I’m feeling rather stupid right now…where is the word “Always” in this picture? 😕 > > It’s not in the picture, it’s in the title banner of the web page. :smack: Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Eggerhaus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d2c977/32.png) [@Eggerhaus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eggerhaus)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/28 "2010-08-21T15:50:55Z")
> [@Philster](#): > > Why no periods now? Because that’s the way it’s done now. Sadly, the local rag (a ghastly excuse for a newspaper if there ever was one) still does it: [http://media.kansascity.com/static/page\_one\_pdfs/SATURDAY.pdf](http://media.kansascity.com/static/page_one_pdfs/SATURDAY.pdf) ---
**Author:** ![C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecd19e/32.png) [@C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C.Montgomery_Burns)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/29 "2010-08-21T16:49:34Z")
Didn’t mean to cause a firestorm of controversy over this one, much less the use of “always”. I just find it interesting that signs, storefronts, and newspaper headlines printed during that time used a period at the end of what was not a grammatical sentence. It’s an interesting artifact of the time, and I wondered why the period was used and why it was discontinued in modern times. ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/30 "2010-08-21T18:42:53Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > > [@Rilchiam](#): > > > > Ah, okay. Now that I know what it is I can see it. > > …and you always will. You poor thing. > > I think there should be a warning akin to linking to TVTropes or PDFs when someone defines of kerning. Spoiler box at the least. We’ve lost too many great people to asylums over the years. It’s like the white arrow in the [FedEx Logo](http://www.mydigitalpainting.com/buynow/images/fedex.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/31 "2010-08-21T19:34:25Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > And check out the lack of kerning in the word “ALWAYS,” near the top. I must be missing something. I can’t find the word “Always” anywhere in that picture. Where is sit? ---
**Author:** ![Cheshire\_Human](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/32 "2010-08-21T20:29:27Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > It’s like the white arrow in the [FedEx Logo](http://www.mydigitalpainting.com/buynow/images/fedex.jpg) [total hijack] When I saw that, it reminded me of the first time I saw [this company’s logo](http://www.dscoop.org/Portals/0/images/xpedx_logo.jpg). My first thought was that the reason they did it that way was so when one of their trucks or planes crashed, even if it landed upside down, the logo was still readable. [/th] ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/33 "2010-08-21T20:51:23Z")
> [@Ronald\_C.Semone](#): > > I must be missing something. I can’t find the word “Always” anywhere in that picture. Where is sit? [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12825376&postcount=26](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12825376&postcount=26) ---
**Author:** ![CWN](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/bc79bd/32.png) [@CWN](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CWN)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2010, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810/34 "2010-08-21T22:17:56Z")
Looking for the always made me notice that there is a saloon-restaurant in the same building. 😕 (also with a period after restaurant) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-period-on-signs-in-the-1800s/550810.md?page=1)