CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, a “monk for the modern age” by George Parker, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.
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A Turkish Delight of musings on languages, deflations of metaphysics, vauntings of arcana, and great visual humor.

Found 35 posts tagged ‘letter a’

Restoring the Lost Sense – October 20, 2024 (permalink)

Seagull.  From Our Bird Friends and Foes by William Atherton DuPuy and illustrated by George Miksch Sutton, 1925.
[Inexplicable images from generations ago invite us to restore the lost sense of immediacy.  We follow the founder of the Theater of Spontaneity, Jacob Moreno, who proposed stringing together "now and then flashes" to unfetter illusion and let imagination run free.  The images we have collected for this series came at a tremendous price, which we explained previously.]
> read more from Restoring the Lost Sense . . .
#vintage illustration #ornate capital #capital a #letter a #bird #1920s #seagull #illustration
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Restoring the Lost Sense – July 17, 2024 (permalink)

From Junior Language Book C by Donalda Dickie, 1945.
[Inexplicable images from generations ago invite us to restore the lost sense of immediacy.  We follow the founder of the Theater of Spontaneity, Jacob Moreno, who proposed stringing together "now and then flashes" to unfetter illusion and let imagination run free.  The images we have collected for this series came at a tremendous price, which we explained previously.]
> read more from Restoring the Lost Sense . . .
#vintage illustration #anthropomorphism #letter a #illustration
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Yearbook Weirdness – April 5, 2024 (permalink)

From West Tennessee State Normal School's 1921 yearbook.

*For some unbelievably weird yearbook imagery, see our How to Hoodoo Hack a Yearbook.
> read more from Yearbook Weirdness . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #clown #vintage yearbook #yearbook #juggling
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Yearbook Weirdness – February 18, 2024 (permalink)

From Armour Institute of Technology's 1928 yearbook.

*For some unbelievably weird yearbook imagery, see our How to Hoodoo Hack a Yearbook.
> read more from Yearbook Weirdness . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #architecture #vintage yearbook #yearbook #1920s #illustration
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Strange Dreams – December 11, 2021 (permalink)

May you dream of singing the "A" note in concert tonight.  From The Gates of the Future Thrown Open by Carlotta de Barsy, 1899.  For other meanings of the letter A, see One-Letter Words: A Dictionary.
If you have a strange dream to share, send it along!
> read more from Strange Dreams . . .
#letter a #dream #singing #symbol
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Yearbook Weirdness – April 17, 2021 (permalink)

Rare to see someone praying to the letter A, in hopes of earning a good grade.  From North Texas' 1918 yearbook.  See Strange Prayers for Strange Times.
> read more from Yearbook Weirdness . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #prayer #vintage yearbook #yearbook #illustration
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The Right Word – May 9, 2020 (permalink)

The Scarlet Letter is defined in One-Letter Words: A Dictionary.  From The Film Daily, 1926.
> read more from The Right Word . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #scarlet letter
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The Right Word – January 24, 2020 (permalink)

"A, by many supposed to be the oldest of the alphabet and constituting, as it does, the initial of Adam's name, was doubtless the only letter in existence at the time Adam learned to write." —Cupid's Cyclopedia by Oliver Herford, 1910. 
> read more from The Right Word . . .
#letter a #one-letter words
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The Right Word – January 15, 2020 (permalink)

"A is the easiest word to spell, with the exception of I."
—Cupid's Cyclopedia by Oliver Herford, 1910.  
> read more from The Right Word . . .
#letter a #one-letter words
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Restoring the Lost Sense – June 28, 2018 (permalink)

From Fliegende Blätter, 1926.
[Inexplicable images from generations ago invite us to restore the lost sense of immediacy.  We follow the founder of the Theater of Spontaneity, Jacob Moreno, who proposed stringing together "now and then flashes" to unfetter illusion and let imagination run free.  The images we have collected for this series came at a tremendous price, which we explained previously.]
> read more from Restoring the Lost Sense . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #cow
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Restoring the Lost Sense – April 15, 2017 (permalink)

From Alfabeto In Sogno (1683) by Giuseppe Maria Mitelli.  Via Publicdomainreview.

[Inexplicable images from generations ago invite us to restore the lost sense of immediacy.  We follow the founder of the Theater of Spontaneity, Jacob Moreno, who proposed stringing together "now and then flashes" to unfetter illusion and let imagination run free.  The images we have collected for this series came at a tremendous price, which we explained previously.]
> read more from Restoring the Lost Sense . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #eyes #illustration #human alphabet #1680s
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Restoring the Lost Sense – February 10, 2017 (permalink)

It's been said that "Fresh language blows a cool breeze through the reader" (Roy Peter Clark, Writing Tools).  And the reader's not the only one.  From Dong Zhi Wu Yan Jiu Fa, c. 1825.
[Inexplicable images from generations ago invite us to restore the lost sense of immediacy.  We follow the founder of the Theater of Spontaneity, Jacob Moreno, who proposed stringing together "now and then flashes" to unfetter illusion and let imagination run free.  The images we have collected for this series came at a tremendous price, which we explained previously.]
> read more from Restoring the Lost Sense . . .
#vintage illustration #letter a #tree #illustration
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Restoring the Lost Sense – June 2, 2016 (permalink)

[Inexplicable images from generations ago invite us to restore the lost sense of immediacy.  We follow the founder of the Theater of Spontaneity, Jacob Moreno, who proposed stringing together "now and then flashes" to unfetter illusion and let imagination run free.  The images we have collected for this series came at a tremendous price, which we explained previously.]
> read more from Restoring the Lost Sense . . .
#vintage illustration #capital a #moon #letter a #illustration
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The Right Word – November 10, 2015 (permalink)

As you know, the letter n is used to mean an unspecified variable, but if you wish to write "A to n" (like "A to Z," but to mean "A to anything") then the letter N would be misleading (as it might be taken to indicate the exact range between the letters A and N), so this is how to do it, as revealed in A Little Spasm at the Home of Wolfgang Mozart. Being a Sketch Printed from What Is (Supposedly) the Original Manuscript of the Little Journey to Mozart, 1901.

> read more from The Right Word . . .
#calligraphy #letter a #flourish
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This Terrible Problem That Is the Sea – May 9, 2015 (permalink)

From Blasts from The Ram's Horn, 1902. 
   ,(   ,(   ,(   ,(   ,(   ,(   ,(   ,(
`-'  `-'  `-'  `-'  `-'  `-'  `-'  `-'  `
"The sea is a cruel mistress. Yet again the sea has behaved unconscionably. It's time to address this terrible problem that is the sea." —Captain Neddie, from the hilarious BBC series Broken News
> read more from This Terrible Problem That Is the Sea . . .
#vintage illustration #ornate capital #letter a #ship #coins #illustration
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