At the turn of the last century, famed typographer Morris Fuller Benton was given the assignment of updating a typeface designed by his father, Linn Boyd Benton, so that it would adhere to the industry standards of the day established by the Typographical Union.

After successfully delivering the project, Benton decided to further develop the typeface into a family; the result was, the “invention” of the world’s first font family, the Century Expanded™ font family.

In 1997, the Font Bureau decided to issue a revival of Century Expanded and tasked Tobias Frere-Jones with repurposing the classic news font. The italics and bold were developed separately by Richard Lipton and Christian Schwartz and based on the Century Schoolbook Italic font family. The result was Benton Modern Text.

Finally, in 2008, designer Dyana Weissmann—along with Lipton—undertook a display cut of Benton Modern Text, Benton Modern Display. The typeface was very well received and praised for its legibility, clarity, and balance between vintage and modern elements. It comes with Light, Regular, Semibold, and Bold in normal, condensed, extra condensed, compressed widths, and Black, Ultra in normal widths, offering a wide range of uses.

References:
Typographica: Our Favorite Typefaces of 2008
Typographica: Benton Modern Display

Benton Modern Display is used in many prominent magazines including W and Money. Newspaper design authority Ed Henninger recommends Benton Modern Display for headlines due to its classic look, describing it as “legible” and “comfortable to read.” It is currently used in publications around the world, from the Southampton Press to the Hindustan Times.