A scholarly but highly entertaining discourse, tracing the changes in spelling and typographical conventions in the 18th century was given on Saturday, September 4, after the Annual General Meeting, by Professor Richard Wendorf, Director and Librarian at the Boston Athenaeum, one of the oldest and most distinguished libraries in the United States.

Professor Wendorf dealt particularly with the disappearance of  the capitalisation of common nouns, and was able to identify the particular issue of  The Gentleman’s Magazine when this took place. The excessive use of italics and small capitals also began to fade in this era.

At question time, Professor Wendorf was also able to cast light on some other intriguing typographical developments, including the gradual disappearance of the "long S".