The string created by "stripper.writeText(pdfDoc, writer)" converts "(e.g., x + y = 7 and x − y = 1)" to "(e.g., x + y = 7 and x ? y = 1)". The minus (-) was changed to a question mark (?). I've identified the font of the minus as Adobe Garamond. I've found a variety of Garamond ttf's but none seem to work. I loaded the ttfs using: PDFont font = PDTrueTypeFont.loadTTF( pdfDoc, new File("garamond.ttf" ) ); As you can see from my example I'm trying to parse mathematical equations. For the most part everything parses nicely, but when every there is a character the parser doesn't recognize it returns a question mark. Any suggestions? Thanks, -Graham