Jeff's Lettering

08/02/2024

08/02/2024

The Boone County Fair is one of our busiest times of the year. I often get asked "why is it that busy for you ?" . . . "don't they have all the signs they need by now ?"

The BC Fair and Fairgrounds are an ever evolving entity, always getting added to or upgraded.

So it goes with the signs as well. This original 4H sign (left) we lettered in 2007, 17 years ago. It was upgraded this year.

The hand painted Fair Parking sign pictured is still in service from some of the first signs we made for the BC Fair, 36 years ago.

I have also been asked how many signs we have made for the Fair / Fairgrounds. Not a clue . . . other than . . . a lot !

07/19/2023

Some more race cars I lettered. All of these and the previous page are hand lettered some with airbrushing as well.

The quality of the photos aren't great . . . they are photos of photos from my old album. 🙂

07/19/2023

I was going to do this earlier in the year and just didn't, but got the urge now. So here it is . . .

With the announced closing of Rockford Speedway earlier this year, it occurred to me that it has been 40 years since I lettered my first late model race car.

I ended up lettering a lot of race cars since then. They were fun to do back in the day. I have chosen not to letter race cars these days, haven't for a few years now.

Here is my first one, Bill McCoy's number 15, 1983. This was VERY early in my lettering career.

Also a couple more from early on.

All of these are hand lettered, and some airbrushing.

I will try to add some more over the next little bit here.

01/10/2023

June 1983, one year after high school graduation. My hand-me-down 1973 Ranchero, and my companion Babe . . . life was good.

Although I was three years into my lettering career, I was not officially in business for my self and at that point didn't have any grand plans to be.

My cousin was still in high school in a work co-op. He needed somewhere to work so "we" started the fictitious "Spradling Signs" sign company so he could be my employee.🙄

Four years later, "we", my future wife and I started Jeff's Lettering a.k.a. Signs by Jeff.

We are starting our 36th year in "real" business.😀

11/21/2022

6' x 20' sign

10/06/2022

Our current work load has me working some crazy stupid hours again.

The thought just occurred to me as I'm applying vinyl on a pain in the a** truck lettering job. If I should kick off while doing this PLEASE don't say "well at least he died doing what he loved"

I can think of at least 3 or 4 other things I would rather be doing at 2 in the morning.😔

P.S. Just for the record I almost never "love" applying vinyl.😏

09/21/2022

Now you fast forward to 2009. Our kids are involved in BUC sports. Dara and I are part of the Buc Boosters Club. We helped spec out a new trailer for the club and lettered it. Just a few days before the Homecoming Parade there was some debate about who / what would pull the new trailer in the parade.

With the help of Cory Dovenmuehle, after some LOOOOONG hours in just a couple of days . . . problem solved . . . "The BUC TRUC 2" came to be.

The Northern IL winters had taken its toll on our old Bronco (before photos) A little patch and putty here and there, Cory putting fresh paint on the ol' girl and it looked pretty damn good !

And ta'da The BUC TRUC 2 . . .

09/20/2022

Deviating from the early hand lettering stuff I have been posting. I had a couple of requests for what happened with the Ranchero in it's second life.

After carting me around for 16 years, time had taken it's toll on the ol' beast. In 2000 it was set to wonder off to the scrap yard. Then I had a brain storm. My nephews were both in sports so with some help from my brother and a couple of other local businesses, the "BUC TRUC" was born.

Boone County Auto Body did a quickie fresh coat of paint. I added some purple aerosol paint highlights, some vinyl lettering and here you go . . . The Belvidere Buc support vehicle.

We took this to a few parades, a lot of school events, both home and away.😉 Even all the way over by the Indiana border for a football play off game.

Up next, BUC TRUC 2 . . .

09/19/2022

This is also from early in my lettering career; all hand lettered. Circa 1985

In memory of my best friend / mentor Roger Foss. He passed away two years ago today.

Before starting my own sign company, I worked for Glenn Avery, Avery Sign Co. for about 1.5 years. Roger was Glenn's friend and former co-worker. (Roger had recently started his own sign co. as well)

We lettered this billboard on the west side of Rockford. This was my first exposure to Roger. We meet there, (I'm not sure if this is the politically correct way to put this) three white guys in a non-white person part of town. Roger pulls out a LARGE boombox and starts playing "area" correct music . . . LOUDLY ! They all look at us like we are crazy. (Maybe that was Roger's plan) I'm thinking "We are not going to survive the day"

That was the start of 30+ years of a friendship that included some of the most fun and memorable times a person could hope to have in their life ! R.I.P. Roger !

As a side note, the original artwork for the mural did not include a white guy. Glenn decided to add himself. One of the car wash guys even said "S**t, that looks just like you !"

Fun Times 😂😎🤪

09/18/2022

Revisiting some of my work from when I hand lettered / pinstriped / airbrushed.

Not the greatest photos but . . .

The many faces of our first shop truck (1979 Ranchero)

Me . . . yup, skinny, young me lettering the Ranchero when we first started our sign / lettering business a tick over 35 years ago.

When we first started our name was Signs by Jeff. We changed it to Jeff's Lettering about 5 years in.

The pink graphics were next. Then the whole puzzle concept came along. The next change was to Jeff's Lettering. It stayed that way for the rest of it's life as our shop truck. More on what happened to it after it was retired at a later time.

09/16/2022

Revisiting some of my work from when I hand lettered / pinstriped / airbrushed.

This was also done around 1996. Hand lettered, airbrushed. The white DENNY'S was reflective vinyl, hand cut with an X-Acto knife.😎

This was one of the last extensive airbrush jobs like this I ever did. Unbeknownst to we sign painters, the government made the paint companies remove lead from lettering paint which ruined the longevity of lettering paint. If memory serves me right, less than a year after completing this job it had faded so bad we removed it and re-lettered it with vinyl.😕

09/14/2022

Revisiting some of my work from when I hand lettered / pinstriped / airbrushed.

I occasionally subbed out my airbrushing abilities to another sign company. They did the lettering of the copy.

The bagels were airbrushed using the businesses actual bagels for models.🙂 The other sign company applied the lettering after we were finished.

The M & R sign is one 1/2" thick piece of MDO (plywood) cut to shape; all airbrushed to look 3D. It is all one flat board. Again, the other sign company applied the lettering after we finished.

09/13/2022

Revisiting some of my work from when I hand lettered / pinstriped / airbrushed.

1996 we went to see Reba at the Metro Centre. I decided to make this sign to give to her. We were hanging around before the show by the buses, her road manager spotted the sign and talked to us. He took the sign from us and said he would see to it that Reba would get it. Although we had attached a business card to the back, we never heard anything about it . . . don't know if she received it or not.

About the sign: This was a flat 1/8" thick roughly 18" x 36" piece of aluminum. The background was a newish trend at the time called marbleizing. Done with multiple colors of paint sort of smeared together. The edges were airbrushed to make it look beveled. The lettering was a combination of hand lettering with airbrushing effects.

I still sort of wish I knew if Reba ever received it.😏

06/28/2022

We never know what we are going to be lettering next. Today we helped give some identity to part of a Reverse Osmosis Water System.

Just a couple of water bottles.😃

05/31/2022

I haven't uploaded any job photos in a while. Some of these go back almost 2 years.

I have been asked a few times recently if I have retired from the lettering business. The answer is, NO. More than likely the day I retire will be my last day I'm alive . . . or maybe the day after.😁

Perhaps some think I retired based on an earlier post about cutting back because of health issues and / or some think the BCFD2 Trustee position I took on is a full time job, it is not.

My life has changed because of the health issues I have and will deal with the rest of my life. I can not physically work the hours that I have been accustom to my whole adult life. Which means I still think I can and I over promise myself . . . I'm working on that.🙄

With that in mind I apologize to those that I have not gotten work done for or in some cases not even returned calls. I will try to get better at managing my responsibilities.

Thank you for the over 40 years of having me letter your stuff . . . I will keep trying until I can't. 😀😎