“Our true nationality is mankind.”
Feeling part of something bigger than a flag.
This line comes on
About this line
Wells was a science fiction writer who decided, at fifty-two, that the problem with civilization was that it had never actually taught people what civilization was. He sat down and wrote a complete history of humanity — from single-celled organisms to the Paris Peace Conference — in about a year. The argument he kept returning to: that human beings had always shared more with each other than with any flag. That the borders were recent. That the species was old. He was not being idealistic. He thought he was being accurate.
Why we carry this line
After a war fought over borders, Wells said the only nationality that counts is being human. I’ll wear that all day. And I do.
The design
Each line gets its own breath. “Nationality” stands alone. So does “is.” So does “mankind.” By the time the last word arrives, it carries everything above it.
The opening mark is warm matte gold. The closing mark is cream, the same as the words. The two don’t match, on purpose. Balance without symmetry.
What happened next
In 1918 Florence Deeks, a teacher in Toronto, sent her manuscript to Macmillan of Canada. It was a history of the world called The Web of the World’s Romance.
In 1920 Wells published The Outline of History. Deeks read it and was sure it had been built on her book.
In 1926 she sued Wells and Macmillan. She lost, appealed, and lost again, all the way to the Privy Council in London in 1932. The judgment noted she had argued “with great candour and great force.”
Documented source
Every quote here is traced to a documented source. How we verify →