Multi-faceted Remington Rand

Remington Rand, Inc. originated from E. Remington & Sons of Ilion, New York, which began manufacturing sewing machines in 1873 and later acquired the rights to produce typewriters from inventor Christopher Latham Sholes in 1876. The Remington No. 1 was the first typewriter to use the QWERTY keyboard layout. The company exhibited its typewriters at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition and expanded globally during the 1880s. The company was formed in 1927 through the merger of the Remington Typewriter Company and the Rand Kardex Bureau, Inc. A division of Remington Rand also made electric razors beginning in 1937.

Remington Rand merged with Sperry Corporation in 1955 to become Sperry Rand. It manufactured the UNIVAC line of mainframe computers, the first commercial computer system, initially for the U.S. Census Bureau. Along this same timeline, they manufactured modular office furniture under the name Remington Rand Modular Furniture. The Sperry Corporation sold the division in 1979 to Victor Kiam, who became the company spokesman. His line, "I liked the shaver so much, I bought the company," became a memorable advertising slogan of the early 1980s. Sperry later merged with Burroughs Corporation in 1986 to become Unisys. Remington Products was sold to the battery manufacturer Rayovac in 2003 (now part of Spectrum Brands). 

A Maxfield Parrish Sky

 

Maxfield Parrish (1870-1966) was one of the most popular artists during the Golden Age of Illustration. During the 1920s, it has been estimated that a quarter of all American households displayed a Parrish print on their walls. His other-worldly landscapes of ancient gnarled trees, tumbling waterfalls, azure skies, or nursery rhymes were painted with a dreamlike clarity. Parrish's art is characterized by vibrant colors; the color Parrish blue was named after him. He achieved such luminous color through glazing. This process involves applying alternating bright layers of translucent glaze separated by varnish over a base rendering. 

One of his techniques set the stage for future commercial illustrators working with constant deadlines. Some models were clothed in geometric patterns, enabling him to accurately capture the distortion and draping. Though a "grid system" produced similar accuracies before photography, Parrish would take photos of projected objects, cut the prints out and place them onto his canvas, then cover them with clear glaze. The American painter Norman Rockwell considered Parrish his idol.

Al Parker (1906-85)

 

Al Parker was an innovative, influential modernist illustrator with mass appeal in women’s magazines. He emerged in the mid-1930s with is move to NYC and established a vibrant visual vocabulary for the new suburban life so desired in the aftermath of the Depression. More graphic and less detailed than the paintings of the influential Norman Rockwell, Parker’s stylish compositions were sought after by editors and art directors for their contemporary freshness. Parker is credited with creating a new school of illustration and was much imitated. To distinguish himself from his imitators, he worked in a variety of styles, themes and media, from children's crayons to acrylics. In cooperation with the magazine's art director, he secretly provided every illustration in an issue of Cosmopolitan, using different pseudonyms, styles and mediums for each story.

See additional Al Parker samples.