American Type Founders (ATF) Co. was a business trust created in 1892 by the merger of 23 type foundries, representing about 85 percent of all type manufactured in the United States at the time. The new company, consisting of a consolidation of firms from throughout the United States, was incorporated in New Jersey. The American Type Founders Co. should not be confused with the American Type Founders' Association, also called the Type Founders' Association of the United States. Both institutions are identified by the same acronym, ATF. The ATF Association was formed in 1864 and was responsible for establishing the American point system in 1886 based on 35 picas exactly equal to 35 cm. The ATF Co. was not formed until 1892. All but six of the 23 foundries in the company were members of the ATF Association. The American Type Founders Co. was the dominant American manufacturer of metal type from its creation in 1892 until at least the 1940s; it continued to be influential into the 1960s. Many fonts developed by the ATF Co. in its period of dominance, including News Gothic, Century Schoolbook, Franklin Gothic, Hobo and Bank Gothic, remain in everyday use. Type founding before the ATF Co. By the beginning of the final decade of the nineteenth century, type founding was in a state of crisis. With the introduction of the Linotype, which could cast whole lines of body type in house, demand for hand-set type was in decline. Throughout the late 1880s, prices had been maintained by an informal cartel of foundries, but as the number of foundries increased, prices dropped dramatically, a trend accelerated by the invention of hot metal typesetting. Additionally, type at this time was not standardized, either to body size or to base line, and printers resented the incompatibility of types from different foundries. Leaders in the industry, notably Joseph W. Phinney of the Dickinson Type Foundry in Boston, set up a committee to address these problems, eventually recommending consolidation. Consolidation and early years By the late 1880s, there were some 34 foundries in the United States. In 1892, 23 foundries were brought together to form the American Type Founders Company. The Chicago Tribune (February 12, 1892) listed the 23 foundries as: MacKeller, Smiths, & Jordan, Co. (Philadelphia), Collins & M’Leester (Philadelphia), Pelouse & Co. (Philadelphia), James Conner’s Sons (New York City), P. A. Heinrich (New York City), A. W.