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

Ice Cutting (Ice Harvesting)
An industry in which blocks of ice are cut from fresh water sources in winter, and stored to be sold as a refrigerant year round. Various methods were used to cut ice but it usually started by scoring out a grid with an ice plow that would then be hand sawed into large blocks. These blocks of ice would be packed in sawdust and stored in huge ice sheds, which were some of the largest buildings of their day. Ice would be delivered on a one or two day schedule to customers owning iceboxes and cut to size. By the 1890’s artificial ice was being manufactured, and the growing use of the refrigerator brought the industry to an end at the close of the First World War.

IG Farben (Interessen-Gemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG)
The world's largest chemical cartel consisting of a conglomerate of German chemical, pharmaceutical, and dye manufactures. Its major members were the companies known today as BASF AG, Bayer AG, Hoechst AG, Agfa-Gevaert Group, and Cassella AG. They formed a loose association in 1916 and formally merged in 1925. Initially most of these companies produced colorants, but as the dangers of a possible military embargo became apparent, they branched out to eventually hold a near monopoly on the world’s chemical production. Shortages of ink outside of Germany during WWI nearly crippled the world’s printing industries. IG Farban did not believe democracies were compatible with big business and became an important financial backer of Adolph Hitler. They established a synthetic oil and rubber plant at Auschwitz making use of 83,000 slave laborers. The cartel is also known for the patent it held on Zyklon-B, the poison used in the death camps. Many American companies developed close ties to the cartel. In 1941 the U.S. Government seized the property of some companies while investigations of DuPont and the Standard Oil Company were dropped to insure their cooperation in the war effort. At the end of WWII, thirteen of IG Farben’s directors were indicted for war crimes at the Nuremberg Trials and sentenced to prison. By 1951 the cartel was broken up into its original founding companies though many parts quickly reunited. IG Farben went on to help create America’s chemical warfare industry.

Ink Cell (Ink Well)
An incised pit that holds ink on the surface of the metal plate used in rotogravure. When photogravure was adapted for use on the faster rotary press, a more fluid ink needed to be used so it could be applied from a fountain and removed with a blade. A special line screen allowed rectilinear ink cells to be etched deep into the printing cylinder, that were better suited to this ink than the old irregular aquatint pattern.

Installment Cards
Postcards issued as a set in which all the cards put together form one single image. They were meant to be sent individually to one person over a short period of time.

Intaglio (from the Italian, to engrave)
A process by which a metal plate, traditionally copper, is incised by tools or acid baths to create a reliefed surface. Ink is pushed into these depressions and the surface wiped clean. Paper is then pressed into the depressions under great pressure from a metal rolling (cylinder) press transferring the image. Well known intaglio techniques include engraving, etching, drypoint, aquatint, and mezzotint. Only engraving produces lines deep enough to stand up to the stress of commercial printing, though etching was sometimes used for printing specialized items.

Iron Gall Ink
A deep blue-black ink primarily made from tannin, vitriol, gum, and water. Its indelible quality coupled with inexpensive ingredients made it popular with artists and for writing from the late Middle Ages into the 20th century. Iron gall ink has good color strength and light-fastness, but it also tends to contain free acids that can be very corrosive to pen nibs and damaging to any paper used with it.

Ives Process (Halftone)
The original halftone process developed by Frederick Ives in 1878 where an image could be reduced to a series of black & white dots that gave the illusion of a full tonal image. The process begins when a photosensitive gelatin plate is exposed to a negative then washed out leaving a surface in relief. A plaster cast is then made of this swelled gelatin. This cast is then pressed against an inked rubber pad, where the ink is only transferred to the highest points on the plaster’s surface. The contours of the cast capture the tonal shades as dots in proportion to the original image. The image pulled from the inked plaster cast is re-photographed, and then this new negative could be transferred to a photosensitive printing plate. This complicated process was patented in 1881 but abandoned by 1885 when Ive’s invented the easier to use line screen. W.A. Leggo and G.E. Desbarats in Canada developed a similar halftone process. The Canadian Illustrated News was the first newspaper to print a halftone image in 1869 using their method. Screen created halftones produced in the years that followed were still sometimes refered to as having been made by the Ives Process, but this was only due to the continued trade name and is not technically correct.