“Helvetica was developed by Max
Miedinger with Eduard Hoffmann in 1957
for the Haas Type Foundry in Münchenstein,
Switzerland. In the late 1950s, the European
design world saw a revival of older sansserif
typefaces such as the German face
Akzidenz Grotesk. Haas’ director Hoffmann
commissioned Miedinger, a former employee
and freelance designer, to draw an updated
sans-serif typeface to add to their line. The
result was called Neue Haas Grotesk, but
its name was later changed to Helvetica,
derived from Helvetia, the Latin name for
Switzerland, when Haas’ German parent
companies Stempel and Linotype began
marketing the font internationally in 1961.
Introduced amidst a wave of popularity
of Swiss design, and fueled by advertising
agencies selling this new design style to
their clients, Helvetica quickly appeared in
corporate logos, signage for transportation
systems, fine art prints, and myriad other
uses worldwide. Inclusion of the font in
home computer systems such as the Apple
Macintosh in 1984 only further cemented its
ubiquity.”
-www.helveticafilm.com