Brown Bag Lecture: Ink Chemists of the Industrial Revolution

Join us for a talk with Lynne Friedmann, our 2016–2017 Société de Chimie Industrielle Fellow.

The Industrial Revolution marked a turning point in history, with almost every aspect of daily life influenced in some way. None was more important than global changes in communication as handcrafted printing became industrial printing production. Heretofore, books and news publications tended to be expensive and oriented toward the elite. New steam-powered presses allowed mass media to enter an industrial phase. With many more readers, advertisers found they could reach more customers, and the cost of printing a newspaper came down even more. The effect was to free the press from financial dependence on political parties and, with the rapid spread of information, to democratize politics.

It was during this time that the first standards for the industrial manufacturing of inks were adopted. Who were the pioneering ink chemists whose contributions were invaluable to modernizing printing?

Lynne T. Friedmann is a freelance science writer with 30 years of experience interpreting scientific discoveries and technological advances for the general public. She is editor of ScienceWriters magazine, published by the National Association of Science Writers. She is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), Association for Women in Science (AWIS), and Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), elected in recognition of her “leadership and significant contributions to the public communication of science and technology.”