A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Cabinet Card
A 4 by 5 1/2 inch photograph, usually on thin albumen or carbon paper, pasted to a rigid 4 1/4 by 6 1/2 inch color board to prevent curling. The photo studio’s name is printed on the card’s front or back very often with decorative gold guilding. They were almost exclusively used for portraiture and sparked the photo retouching profession. Though often put out in display cabinets, they were made in a specific size to fit into specially made collectors albums. Photographs of various consistant sizes that were pasted to cards went by different names such as Boudoir, Imperial, Promenade, Trilby, and Victoria, but the cabinet card was the most popular. Though not meant to be sent through the mail, they were in many ways a precursor to real photo postcards. The introduction of heavy weight photo paper needed to make real photo postcards made mounted cards relatively expensive and unnecessary, which helped usher their demise. Introduced in 1863, these cards were popular until the turn of the century though manufactured until 1924.

Cachet
A rubber hand stamp placed on a letter or postcard by an institution other than a Government Post Office. They were usually designed and used to commemorate a special event. Sometimes an official hand stamped cancel that contains an unusual design is also referred to as a cachet.

Calendering
The pressing of paper between two metal rollers in its final stage of manufacture. As pulp dries on a screen, the pattern of the screen will impart itself onto one side of the paper while the other will develop a rough and irregular surface. These natural papers are often used for art works but provide a poor substrate for commercial printing. The printing of fine detail is best done on smoother surfaces and so paper is usually flattened by passing it between heavy polished rollers, called cold press, or if a very smooth surface is desired the rollers can be heated, a process referred to as hot press. Various textures can also be embossed into the paper at this stage by creating a textured stereotype for one of the rollers. The calendering process is also used on textiles and to create plastic sheets.

Cancel (Postmark)
The placement of a mark over postage to designate that it has been accepted into use by a postal system and to prevent it from being used for postal services again. There are various types of cancels and the more unique ones are collected. One type of collectible cancel has different designs or slogans incorporated within them. Another category are cancels from unusual postal facilities such as those on ships, railroads, trolleys, pneumatic offices, and from expositions. Sometimes cards with rural free delivery (R.D.F.) cancels fall into this category. Postmarks issued from defunct post offices or U.S. Territories are also collected. Certain cancels can add great value to a postcard’s worth.

Carbo Colour
A trade name for a type of lithographic postcard printed by Valentine’s during the 1930’s. It is characterized by an open halftone with added ben day patterns. It is printed in distinct RGB colors that blend so little the card appears to be hand colored

Carbon Print
A photographic print made by the triple transfer of an image on gelatin emulsions. Three pieces of paper are coated with a photosensitive gelatin emulsion containing carbon powder. The first sheet is exposed to a negative and developed out in water. It is then positioned emulsion to emulsion with a second sheet of hardened gelatin, and pressed together into one piece. The paper from the first sheet is then removed. This thin gelatin film is called carbon tissue. The areas on it exposed to light have hardened while the remaining gelatin has washed away. But because the fully exposed areas are now attached to the new paper side, the remaining mid-tones and highlights tend to wash off producing images with poor tonal range. Since this image was transferred from one tissue to another it is now in reverse, and must be transferred by the same process to the third emulsion to regain a correctly oriented image. This is basically a gum printing process elaborated on by Alphonse Louis Potevin in 1855.

In 1864 Joseph Wilson Swan took this process further by adjusting the transfer process so that the gelatin emulsion was only washed after the first transfer and from the opposite side. An alum bath would harden the remaining gelatin. This emulsion was known as gelatin tissue. The prints created through these improvements display a wide and rich tonal range. Substituting various pigments for the original carbon could change the color of the final print. Because no silver is used these photographs are known for their permanence. The process was most widely used between 1870 and 1910 but the invention of gelatin tissue had other applications and a longer lasting effect on the printing industry.

Carbon Tissue
A gelatin emulsion photosensitized with potassium dichromate and infused with a fine carbon powder, patented by Alphonse Louis Poiteven in 1855. John Pouncy improved on this tissue in 1858, and again by J.W. Swan in 1864 with the development of gelatin tissue.

Card Photo
A photograph, usually albumen, pasted onto stiff paperboard. Early photographs were made on thin sheets of paper that suffered from extreme curling due to the emulsion on one sided drying at a different rate than the plain paper back. They were pasted to paperboard to prevent this curling. Card photos almost always had borders and came in a range of set sizes so they could more easily be collected in albums. Each size had its own name with the most popular varieties being the cartes de visite, the cabinet card, and the stereo-view. As postcards became popular, photo paper began to be manufactured on a heavier stock to create real photo postcards that did not curl as much. As real photo postcards were less expensive to produce they quickly replaced card photos.

Card Stock (Pressboard)
A stiff heavyweight paper used when durability is needed. It can be manufactured in a thick single sheet but it usually consist of many thinner sheets of paper pressed or pasted together. Each layer is referred to as a ply. Pressboard is used for postcards and trade cards among other items. On postcards manufactured without adequate paste or stored in damp conditions, the different plies can sometimes separate from one another.

Cartephilia
An archaic term used in the early 20th century to describe postcard collecting. It was passed down years later to describe those who collect reward or trading cards (Cartephiles).

Cartel
An agreement made between corporations to work together in addressing mutual business concerns such as price fixing, supply limits, and sales quotas, all to stifle competition. Cartel agreements often create de facto monopolies. Though outlawed in the United States by antitrust laws, cartels can be mostly found in Europe where they operate on international levels.

Cartes de Visite (Visiting Card)
A photograph, usually albumen, pasted to a rigid 2 1/2 by 4 inch card. The photo studio’s name is printed on the card’s front or back. Introduced by the Frenchman Andre Adolphe Eugene Disdore in the 1850’s, they remained popular until the 1880’s. These cards served many purposes from personal calling cards, to album collectables of family and famous personalities. They were often referred to as Album Cards. These cards were eventually replaced in popularity by the larger cabinet card.

Celesque
A type of early offset lithographic postcard printed in a series by the Photochrom Company. They were untypical for their time for they were printed in red, yellow, and blue utilizing a rosette pattern. Celesque cards were printed in Great Britain.

Chase
An iron or steel frame containing letterpress type or block images. When locked together for printing on a press bed they create a form.

Checklist
A list of titles and identification numbers of postcards issued by a single publisher. Collectors sometimes put checklists together as few such records exist from the companies themselves. Many publishers kept bad records and many of those that did accurately exist were often destoyed in war or were discarded after the company went out of business. Only a few complete checklists exist for postcards.

Chemical Paper
Paper made by cooking wood chips in a bisulfate of lime or a caustic soda at high temperatures. This reduces wood into pure cellulose that can be further processed into different paper types. It is often bleached and sometimes combined with other types of fibers. It contains high chemical residue that eventually causes paper made with this pulp to yellow and become brittle with age. Most postcards as almost all ephemera are made from this pulp.

China Clay (Kaolin)
A white clay mineral kaolinite (hydrous aluminum silicate), formed by the decomposition of aluminum silicates, particularly feldspar. The Chinese used Kaolin since the 7th century in the manufacture of porcelain. Today it is most widely used in the coating of papers to create a bright glossy surface.

Chine Collé (Chine Appliqué)
A process in which a thin sheet of paper with a light dried coating of water soluble paste on its back is placed between an inked intaglio plate and a thicker sheet of moist paper during printing. When pulled from the plate after printing a bond is formed between the two papers creating one single sheet. Traditionally a China paper, made from bamboo was used, but the technique is possible with most thin papers. Though sometimes employed to create a finer impression on heavy stock, these papers were most often used to create a toned or color backdrop to the image that normal printing papers did not offer. Chine Collé was also used in a collage fashion to create decorative elements within an image.

Chinoiserie
A decorative style introduced to Europe in the late 1600’s by the large scale arrival of imported goods and pictures from China. While Chinoiserie had its greatest influence among those countries with the most Chinese trade, England, Holland, and Portugal, the style eventually spread to all parts of Europe. It was applied primarily to architecture in the creation of fanciful structures of unusual proportions that often employed lacquer like materials. Pagodas filled the gardens of many large estates. The style peaked in the mid 18th century when Rococo dominated the arts. As America entered the China trade similar influences began to appear there but to a lesser extent. This style would eventually blend into the more powerful influences from Japan after 1860.

Chloride Paper
A blue light sensitive photo paper coated with an emulsion of silver chloride in gelatin. When first introduced chloride paper was considered so fast that it was marketed as capable of being exposed under gaslight (gaslight paper), as opposed to exclusively by sunlight. This paper however remained too slow for enlarging and was used only for contact printing. Chloride paper is printed out and produces a very fine tonal range with excellent detail, but it tends to produce a yellow or red cast, so it is often toned. It was the first paper used for real photo postcards.

Chrome
Short for photochrome. Chrome is also sometimes used as a suffix to another name designating a specific printing process related to lithography. It is also sometimes used as a suffix to another name designating a specific type of transparency film.

Chromatic
Perceived as having a hue, not white, gray or black.

Chromolithography (Lithochrome)
The term as most come to use it means a lithographic print produced in three or more colors. Color lithography had been around since the process was invented in 1796, but Godefrey Engleman first put it into commercial use during the 1830’s in France. America’s first chromolithograph was made in Boston in 1840. By the late 19th century some images were being printed in as many as thirty colors to duplicate the effects of paintings. This made them difficult to print since tight registration was needed to create a flawless image. Chromolithographs often suffer from looking dull as light cannot easily pass through all the layers of ink and reflect back off the paper’s surface. Chromolithographic prints had immense popularity with the rising middle class. From this process a whole range of printed color paper products flooded the market and in 1889 the world’s first color postcard was printed in Austria. For the remainder of the Century chromolithography was the primary method of producing color cards. While many forms of color lithographs exist, those drawn by hand rather than produced through photography are called chromolithographs.

Chromoxylography
An early method of color printing in which three separate wood engraved blocks would be inked in red, blue, and yellow, and when printed together would yield a single color image. Although labor intensive, this method was not usually used for quality illustrations. This method created a distinct look especially when applied to simple illustrations such as those for comics. This style would create a tradition that was carried on in comics even when they began being printed in lithography.

Cigarette Card
Free reward cards containing advertising and other imagery that accompanied the purchase of cigarettes. Allon & Ginter were the first to print images on the cardboard stiffeners in cigarette packs in 1886, and the trend continued into the 1930’s. Cigarette cards like the trade cards that inspired them, became collectors items before postcards, and reached their peak in popularity between the two World Wars. Production stopped during WWII due to supply shortages, and they were never produced in large numbers again. They had been the most popular form of reward card.

Cirkut Camera
One of many types of rotating panoramic cameras. These cameras first made their appearance in 1857 but the most popular was the Cirkut cameras made by the Century Camera Co. of Rochester, N.Y. in 1907. It was designed to take shots of large groups of people, for the rotation of the camera allowed it to be moved close in to the subject and still capture the entire scene. They came in different sizes using filmstrips between two and twenty feet long. The Eastman Kodak Company bought them out and continued to manufacture Cirkut cameras. Many multi-paneled postcards were made from photographs taken by these cameras. Modern variations of this camera are still used today.

Clucking Clerk
A postcard vending machine in which the buyer makes a card selection, inserts money, and then the card is dispensed by a chicken. This device made its first appearance in Hot Springs, Arkansas with chickens trained by animal psychologist Keller Breland. Despite the fame these birds received from magazine articles and television shows they were never paid more than chicken feed.

CMYK Colors
Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black, (CMYK), form the basis of process printing. The "K" meaning Key is used to signify black to avoid confusion with blue. The combination of these primary subtractive colors in varying proportions is what creates the illusion of a full color printed image. When all three subtractive primaries are combined as pure light, black is formed. But chemical color pigments react differently than light energy; they cannot absorb all wavelengths and create a dark muddy brown instead. Because of the inability of inks to mix into an optical black, black ink needs to be added to the three primaries as a fourth color.

Coated Paper
Paper that has a coating applied to it giving the sheet a brighter, glossier appearance, and improved printability by preventing ink absorption. Paper was originally coated by hand, but the process was completely mechanized by the mid-19th century. Coatings are made from substances like China Clay or calcium carbonate, and can account for 50% of a paper’s weight.

Cockle Finish
A finish on machine made paper that is made to resemble the uneven puckered finish of hand made paper. This effect is created by air drying the paper under little or no tension. Most often used for bond writing paper. A Cockle finish was also sometimes used on the image side of postcards, making the printing technique employed difficult to discern as it can cause inks to blur.

Collectable
A manufactured item that possesses the attractive characteristics necessary to cause someone to save it without any regard to its practical use. Collectibles can be ephemera, those paper objects such as tickets or match covers that were made to be discarded after use, or they can also be objects that never served a practical purpose but were specifically made for the collector such as baseball cards. Many items as postcards fall between categories. The term collectable entered general use in the 1930’s to distinguish vintage objects from antiques which implies an age of at least a hundred years. Postcards are now shifting from collectable to antique by that definition. Natural objects like seashells are not considered collectables even though they are collected.

Collodion
A base for photo emulsions invented by J.B. Obernetter in Germany in 1867. Collodion is made from nitrocellulose suspended in ether or alcohol, making it highly flammable and dangerous to use. It was mixed with silver chloride to produce printing out papers in both matte and glossy surfaces. While producing brown to purplish hues it could also be toned into many colors. Its was appreciated for the sharp detail and subtleties it captured often causing collodion photos to be mistaken for platinum prints. It lost its popularity around 1900 but was still in use to about 1920.

Collotype (Glass Printing)
A continuous tone printing process invented by Josef Albert in Germany in 1868. It starts with a glass plate coated with a photosensitive dichromate colloid gelatin. When exposed to light through a reverse negative, the lit areas harden into an insoluble finish in proportion to the tones of the image. The dichromate in areas with little or no exposure to light is washed out from the gelatin in cold water. It is then printed in a similar manor to a lithograph. A solution of glycerin and water is spread over the plate's surface, which is absorbed by the gelatin. The dark tones absorb little or no moisture while the lighter tones and non-image areas absorb the most. When greasy ink is rolled over the plate, the non-image areas holding the most moisture repel the ink, and the dry hardened image areas attract the ink. The image is then transferred to paper through a flatbed cylinder press. This process is prized for its fine detail, higher than that of Lithography or Gravure. It remains the most accurate reproductive printing method available today. The glass plate however was a major drawback for it is very fragile and usually yields 1000 impressions, 2000 at the most. This severely limited its commercial use but it proved adequate for the small press runs and was widely used for postcards. The shallow plate cannot produce the dark rich tones of Gravure, but this makes it very receptive to hand coloring. This process was elaborated on in different ways resulting in many names such as albertype, autogravure, heliotype, lichtdruck, and photo-type. The collotype method was eventually adapted to gelatin coated aluminum plates that could be used on rotary presses. This increased output and made it a relatively cheap and fast printing method for its day. There have been claims that this process was more popular in Europe because their general lower humidity produced superior printed results. The collotype process has been largely abandoned since the 1940’s except in the fine arts.

Colorant
The ingredients that impart color to another substance. Colorants can be dyes or pigments.

Color Filter
A transparent sheet of dyed glass, plastic, or gelatin used in photography to selectively absorb certain colors of the visual spectrum while permitting others to pass through. For color separation, filters of the three additive primaries, red, green, blue, are used. A red filter is used to create a cyan negative, a green filter produces magenta, and a blue filter will produce yellow.

Color Photo Engraving
An intaglio printing process by which a print simulating natural color can be created from a black & white photograph. This method was made possible by Frederick Ives’ invention of panchromatic emulsions in 1881. The same subject was shot through three different color filters from which more accurate halftone color separations are created, then photographically transferred to a series of plates, each individually inked in a process color. It was a complicated and expensive printing method and never did well commercially.

Colorpoeme
A trade name used by the Lumitone Press for their illustrated postcard series depicting views of New York City by Pierre Trapier issued in the 1930’s. Trapier was a well known artist at this time who created a large body of work depicting the great cities of the United States and Europe. Many of these pictures were reproduced in both postcard and print formats.

Color Separation
The process of dividing an image into individual color segments. Each color segment is copied onto a printing plate, separately inked in different colors, and when printed in perfect registration produces a full colored image. The first color separations were based solely on interpretations of various color theories, and dependent on the retoucher’s skill to divide hues. After photography became available, reproductions were largely made from black & white photography where the placement of colors continued being discretionary. The arrival of panchromatic emulsions allowed accurate color separations to be made on a scientific basis from multible black & white photographs taken through color filters. More natural looking images could now be created while printing with a more limited pallet. Color film would eventually simplify the use of filters, and separations were now made according to subtractive color theory. Process cameras are able to create large halftone negatives for each needed color. An intermediate color separation would sometimes be made, and then retouched before creating the final halftone. Today optical scanners create color separations with the information registered digitally. Scanned color separations can be quickly manipulated and edited in an infinite number of ways using computer software.

Colourtone
A trade name for a type of postcard produced by Valentine’s during the 1930’s. Colourtones were printed in lithographic halftones using a distinct red, yellow, and blue pallet. These cards are distinguished by wide Tartan patterned borders with symbolic elements added.

Commercialchrome
A trade name for a type of postcard that was printed in four-color halftone lithography by the Curt Teich Company in the United States.

Comstock Laws
Passed on March 3rd, 1873 at the urging of Anthony Comstock’s New York Society for the Suppression of Vice and the Y.M.C.A., prohibiting the U.S. mails to be used for the transmission of obscene materials. More than 120 tons of books were seized and burned under these laws from authors such as Honore de Balzac, Victor Hugo, Ernest Hemingway, Eugene O' Neil, James Joyce, D.H. Lawrence, John Steinbeck, Leo Tolstoy, William Faulkner, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. At least 18 million postcards were also destroyed and more than 3500 publishers prosecuted. When a play of George Bernard Shaw was banned from the mail, he coined the term Comstockery, to denote censorship based on prudery. This law was used extensively to ban all information regarding birth control until that section was repealed in 1936. The rest of the law remains on the books and is still in use.

Contact Print
A photographic print made by exposing a photosensitive paper to negative film with both emulsions in direct contact to one another. No enlarger is needed as the negative rests against the paper under glass to keep it flat and contact even. The resulting print is the same size as the negative. In 1902 Kodak released Velox photo paper that was not only the same size as a postcard, but also the same size as the negative produced by their camera. This made making real photo postcards relatively easy, and most were created this way. To achieve a white tab on a contact printed photo a mask need to be used that cropped part of the image. Contact printing is used for exposures on photo papers that have poor light sensitivity and is required by papers that must be exposed to sunlight.

Continental Card
A larger than standard postcard measuring 4 by 6 inch (10 by 15-cm). Continentals have been produced in Europe since the 1930&rsquos, largely by Germany and the Solviet Union, but they have only become popular in the United States since the late 1970’s. They now rival standard size postcards in sales. This size has also become the most favored for digital photo prints.

Continuous Tone
A characteristic where a range of tones from black, through grays, to white have no discerning demarcations between each other. The term is usually used to denote the subtly blended tones produced by a printing process without the employment of halftone screens.

Contract Card
A postcard manufactured by contract for a small publisher either through a larger publisher or directly with a printer. Most often Contract cards refer to a set of cards printed specifically for the promotion of a business such as a hotel or railroad, and for commercial photographers that have no means to print their own cards.

Copper Window
View-cards in which the windows of depicted buildings are covered in copper or another metal to make them shine under reflected light. When printed onto a card these metallic incks required their own plate and press run. (See Bronzing)

Copperplate
An intaglio method of printing text from a metal plate (usually copper) where the letters are engraved into it. Copperplate is largely used for items printed in very limited quantities such as invitations, or for special pages inserted into books where a more ornamental text style was needed that could not be set in type.

Copyright
The exclusive right granted to an individual or business by a government, to publish, reproduce, and distribute any literary or artistic work they create for a specified number of years. Because of the difficulty in obtaining a copyright most early postcards were not copyrighted. The copyright notice on postcards usually belongs to the photographer who supplied the photograph the image was made from, which can date from a much earlier time than the printing of the card.

Correspondence Card
In the United States a type of postcard that was privately printed prior to the effective date, July 1, 1898, of the Private Mailing Card Act of May 19, 1898. Writing could only be placed on the front, as the back was entirely reserved for the address and stamp. It required two cents to mail. These cards often carried only simple illustrations as they were often designed for correspondence and not as souvenirs. This term was also used by some countries to describe their official government issued postals.

Coupon Cards
Postcards published by a newspaper that could be acquired by redeeming coupons appearing in that same newspaper. Different sets of cupon cards were usually offered on a weekly basis. The exchange of coupons for postcards was a promotional gimmick primarily used in the years 1904 to 1910.

Court Size
Postcards ranging between 2 1/4 by 3 1/4 inches and 3 1/2 by 4 1/2 inches that began being manufactured in Great Britain in 1894. These privately printed cards were required by law to be smaller than Government issued postal stationary. On November 1, 1899 this size requirement was repealed, which allowed all postcards to be made in the standard size.

Cover
A paper sheet that is meant to cover mailed correspondence for protection and privacy. Eventually covers were manufactured in the form we now refer to as an envelope. More often this term specifically refers to mailing envelopes that have a picture printed on them. Patriotic themes are the most common type of illustration to be found on them, which became highly popular during the American Civil War. Illustrated covers were sometimes purchased as a display of patriotism, or saved after use. Covers continue to be made and are now saved as collectables, often in conjunction with related postmarks such as first day issues.

Crayon Print
A matte surfaced black & white photograph that is hand colored with a crayon specially manufactured for that purpose. There is little information on early crayons except they were most likely made from colored chalks. In the 1930’s Kodak introduced their own set of soluble crayons in a boxed kit.

Cropping
The elimination of part of an image during a phase in its reproduction. Because of the poor light sensitivity of early photo papers photographs needed to be contact printed. To make a large print, a large negative was needed thus shooting in a large format became a standard practice. When many of these large negatives were later used to make a small postcard the image had to be cropped down. The composition on large negatives was often expansive enough to produce cards in either horizontal or vertical formats. When a card was reprinted the cropping often shifted creating a different if not wholly new composition. Even when negatives were eventually manufactured at postcard size, cards were still susceptible to cropping as masks to create writing tabs were placed in different sections of the card. Images were also purposely cropped in various ways so that a single negative could produce different looking cards reducing cost.

Cross-Over Cards
A postcard whose subject matter allows it to be categorized under a number of different topics. For instance a depiction of a sledding scene may be filed under Children, Sleds, Winter, Winter Sports, or even possibly Artist Signed cards in addition to location.

Curteichcolor
A trade name used by the Curt Teich Company to designate postcards printed as modern photochromes. Their identification numbers incorporated the letter K.

Cutout Post Cards (Newspaper Cards)
Postcards published by newspapers and distributed in sheet form as free supplements to their papers. These cards needed to be cut apart for mailing, which often gave them irregular edges. They were printed on paper rather than heavier card stock, which led many of them to be saved more often than mailed. Cutout postcards were first issued in 1903 during the Hearst-Pulitzer newspaper wars. Many other newspapers eventually copied the idea. These types of cards were rarely seen beyond 1907.

Cyanotype
A type of photographic print in a blue monochrome. Sir John Hirchel invented the process in 1842, so he could make copies of his scientific notes. Cyanotype paper is made photosensitive by coating it with ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide. This solution soaks into the paper’s fibers rather than resting on its surface as most other emulsions. When exposed to light through contact printing with a negative, the iron compounds break down by oxidation. The exposure is then printed out, which causes a further reaction between the new iron salts and the potassium ferricyanide. Ferroprusate is formed in the areas that were exposed to light yielding a photographic image in Prussian blue. Sometimes these colors can range from a blue-black to purple if variations in processing are made. Though they fade in light, many homemade real photo postcards were made this way. They generally went out of fashion in the 1920’s. Variants such as kallitypes, palladium, and platinum prints utilize the same basic iron salt chemistry. Architectural blueprints are also made through this process.

Cyclorama
(See Panorama)

Cyko Paper
A blue light sensitive, silver chloride photo paper introduced in 1904 by the Columbia Photo Paper Company. In 1907 they became the Ansco Company and produced this paper until the company merged with Agfa Products of IG Farben in 1928. Cyko paper had poor light sensitivity and was used for contact printing.

Cylinder Press
A press that uses a hard metal cylinder to provide pressure to transfer an image from a printing plate onto a sheet of paper. These presses came in many manifestations of types and sizes to accomplish a wide variety of tasks. Most were steam powered throughout the 19th century. They evolved into the rotary press where the plate migrated from the press bed onto the cylinder itself.