Designed in 1904 by Morris Fuller Benton for the American Type Founders company, Franklin Gothic was originally conceived as only one weight. Over the next several years, the ATF family was expanded to include italic, condensed, condensed shaded, extra condensed and wide variants. For some unknown reason no light or intermediate weights were ever created. In 1979, under license from ATF, International Typeface Corporation created four new weights ? Book, Medium, Demi and Heavy ? in roman and italic versions. Designed by Victor Caruso, these new designs matched the pure characteristics of the original Franklin Gothic, adhering closely to the subtle thick and thin pattern of the original ATF typeface while featuring a slightly enlarged lowercase x-height. This increased x-height ? which improved the typeface's appearance and readability ? and the availability of larger family made ITC Franklin Gothic a preferred choice when setting large blocks of sans serif text. Franklin Gothic was named by Morris Fuller Benton in honor of Benjamin Franklin, whom Benton greatly admired for his significant contributions to American history and culture, and to printing in particular.

Franklin is comprised of twenty-three styles overall, including condensed (with small caps), compressed, and extra compressed widths. The normal and condensed widths are served with manually hinted TrueType outlines, for crisp rendering at small sizes. The compressed and extra compressed styles are served with PostScript-based outlines for the best possible rendering results at display sizes.

Franklin Gothic Extra Condensed Font Free Download