Representation of square roots (from Re: Anything from the Symbol font to add along with W*dings?)

On Saturday 13 August 2011, Jukka K. Korpela <jkorpela_at_cs.tut.fi> wrote:
 
> Traditional math notations require advanced typesetting and cannot be implemented in plain text; and when one needs to linearize such notations to plain text, radicals are among the minor issues—as √(a + b) with no vinculum would be quite acceptable, and so would sqrt(a + b).
 
I remember reading in the 1960s a publication from the Monotype Corporation in England that publicised the 4-line mathematics system for the typesetting of mathematics.
 
I seem to remember that that system included a character that one might describe today as like a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS yet with a steeper angle with respect to the horizontal. The idea was that in order to typeset the square root of an expression one did not use a line above the expression of which the square root was to be taken, one used a symbol like U+221A SQUARE ROOT, followed by the expression, followed by the steep-angled reverse solidus.
 
I have today found the following on the web about the 4-line mathematics system.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Times_Roman#Times_4-line_Mathematics_Series_569
 
William Overington
 
13 August 2011
 
Received on Sat Aug 13 2011 - 11:10:12 CDT