Thanks, George.   I'm going to check my Personal Shorthand manual, tho, because I think they use "brief forms" for theirs, too, and I'm wondering if the American Book Company was the first publisher of the Briefhand — later renamed Personal Shorthad — manual.

I have a 1939 edition of this book, and it is indeed Gregg, although the title page states "Gregg Edition", which makes me wonder if it was also published in another system . . .   There's a note too, on the title page, that "Shorthand outlines reproduced by permission of The Gregg Publishing Company, New York, N.Y.  Shorthand plates written by Mrs. David J. Ramsey."    My book also has a handwritten poem on a sheet of notebook paper tucked inside the front cover, titled "The Ideal Girl."  It starts out:   "Modest, gentle, sweet, demure Fair as a lily and as pure . . ."   You gotta wonder . . .   Alex