"Helvetica" turns 50, still not in OED?

[James Harbeck]

>Gill Sans isn't in. Courier isn't in. Palatino isn't in.
>New Century isn't in.
>
>One must acknowledge that Baskerville, Bembo, Bodoni, Caslon
>(which OED2 is mainly set in), Garamond, Old English, Porson,
>Times, and some others are in, so it can't be said that OED
>rejects typefaces as a class. I think one could make a good
>case that Helvetica and others could be entered in OED.

And a good case that eponymy substantially boosts the odds of
inclusion -- only one of your "out" list (Gill Sans) is named after a
type designer (Palatino was a calligrapher, but, true, it's still an
eponym), while nearly all of your "in" list is. (Helvetica is a
place, of course, but it has no direct association with the font as
Times does, for instance.) Perhaps if Helvetica had kept the name
Neue Haas Grotesk, or if the foundry had just shortened it to Haas
rather than changing it altogether to Helvetica, it would be in there
already. Or maybe nobody would have bought it -- that's what
Stempel's marketing department was worried would happen.

Ciao,
James Harbeck.

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