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)
Ice cutting is a defunct industry in which blocks of ice are cut from fresh water sources in winter, and then transported to warmer climates or 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 and then it would then be hand sawed into large blocks. These blocks of ice would be packed in sawdust and stored in huge towering 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 needed size. By the 1890’s artificial ice began being manufactured, and the growing use of the refrigerator brought the industry to an end by the close of the First World War.

IG Farben (Interessen-Gemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG)
IG Farben is 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 into the dealings 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 ink cell is an incised pit that holds ink on the surface of the metal plates used in rotogravure. When photogravure was adapted for use on the faster rotary press, a more fluid ink was needed so it could be dispensed from a fountain and removed with a blade. A special line screen allowed rectilinear ink cells to be photo etched deep into the printing cylinder, that were better suited to this particular ink than the traditional irregular aquatint pattern. The ink in each cell was held in place by high ridges that printed white but were so thin as to be invisible to the naked eye.

Installment Cards
Installment cards are a series of postcards issued as a set that create a single image when all the cards put together in a particular order. Each card was meant to be sent individually to one person over a short period of time.

Intaglio
Intaglio, from the Italian, to engrave is 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 after the surface is wiped clean, paper is then pressed into these depressions under great pressure from a metal rolling (cylinder) press transferring the image. Well known intaglio techniques include engraving, etching, drypoint, aquatint, and mezzotint. Of these only engraving produces lines deep enough to stand up to the stress of commercial printing, though etching was sometimes used for printing specialized items. Gravure is not a traditional intaglio method but one designed for commercial work.

Inserts (Tip-ins)
Inserts can consist of either illustrations or type that is printed separately from the signatures of a book and pasted in during binding. This was usually done when a superior printing technique was required for a particular illustration above that allocated for general text. This method was also used to mount images on postcards when they were printed on paper too thin to mail or when combining very different materials.

Iron Gall Ink
Iron Gall Ink is 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 general 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. Its corrosive effects can be found on many postcards.

Ives Process (Halftone)
The Ives process developed by Frederick Ives in 1878 was the first in which an image could be reduced to a series of black & white dots that gave the illusion of full tonal range. 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, which 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 Ives invented the much 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. In the years that followed, halftones created with the newer screens were still sometimes referred to as having been made by the Ives Process, but this was only due to the continued use of the trade name and is not technically correct.