That was probably done by hand.

I agree. Identical letters are not identical.

However, I will look to see if it resembles a typeface from that era.

Ooops! I thought I cancelled that first post. Yves, you have your eraser handy?

Hm, interesting.. I dug up another version, quite a sloppy job:

It resembles Radiant in some of its Photo-Lettering forms, but that's about as close as I could find for thick-thin sans (as Photo-Lettering called them).

At least a few forms still live as digital fonts, such as the PL version from Agfa seen here at Phil's Fonts.

The Red Rooster version of Radiant has the right A, but wrong R (which can be found in the Alternate face from RR)

What would be a good common digital typeface I could start with and alter a bit? (This is just for a school project.)

Thanks for your help!