You might visit the websites of the current type publishers. They often will specify the year a font (or an earlier version of a font) was created. This will of course give you initial dates of use, but fonts created 100 or more years before 1870 might still be in use.

Rather than microfilm, you might find that a university library is a good hunting ground for old type. A long established library will have many books on the shelves that are over 100 years old.

thank you! I had not thought of the Uni Library. Let's hope the local schools have what I'm looking for.

I have been getting closer to what I'm looking for.

I'm hoping to study typefaces such as the ones found in the GRAND THEATRE and BLACKPOOL posters found here

And the stuff Christopher H. Bing used in his re-design of "Casey at the Bat" in 2000.

It's the first time in my life as a designer that type strikes a deep and resonant nearly emotional chord in me.

Link
here
(sorry, no pics of the interior spreads which are stellar! That first spread blew me away! I finally understood the genius behind the genuine typesetters of the era he was emulating.)

I simply must study this further. I am quite possessed by this in fact.

Those posters are hand lettered. I want to say hand drawn, but I suspect they were created as woodcuts. I've long harboured a fantasy of building a font based on one of these, a Grand Trunk Railway timetable from about that time.

I just looked, and can't find a link to it, but you might find the two sites below of interest. Railway and Steamship schedules of that era should have similar work.

http://www.sullboat.com/1883%20Timetable,%20Cover.jpg
http://www.lac-bac.gc.ca/trains/h30-2061-e.html#f

Awesome!

that first grand trunk poster is awesome!

I also saw something while watching "The Illusionist". A poster that simply says EISENHEIM I can not find an image. Anyone know what I'm reffering to? Where I could get my hands on fonts of that nature?