Ib Penick

Ib Penick
Born(1930-05-11)May 11, 1930
Odense, Denmark
DiedApril 21, 1998(1998-04-21) (aged 67)
Wilmington, North Carolina, U.S.
OccupationsPaper Engineer, Inventor
Children3

Ib Penick (1930–1998), a native of Denmark, was known as "the creative mind behind the resurgence of pop-up children's books in the 1960s and 1970s. In his career, Penick designed more than 130 children's books, including Star Wars: a Pop-up Book, which sold more than a million copies. Penick related to one reporter, "...there are only about 100 folds and tricks to [his paper engineering] trade. It's like playing a piano. You have only a certain number of keys, but it's the combinations that make the difference."

Biography

In the 1960s Penick joined Waldo Hunt at Graphics International, a firm that created pop-up books, including a series of titles for Random House and other publishers. Penick was the "premier paper engineer" for the Random House pop-up titles, with Tor Lokvig as his protege. According to Gerald Harrison, a former president of the children's books division at Random House, Penick "was really responsible for creating the whole world we lived in. With the advent of the Random House line, a whole industry was created and the very first ones were created by Ib."

Penick and Hunt later sold Graphics International to Hallmark Cards in 1966.

Selected bibliography

The following is a sample of the pop-up books paper engineered by Ib Penick:

Patents

Penick held several patents in the area of paper engineering, camera design and packaging, including:

  1. A U.S. patent 4784314 A– Decorative paperboard boxes
  2. A U.S. patent 4313270 A– Item with pivoting pop-up
  3. A U.S. patent 4337589 A– Method of making hinged pop-up items
  4. A U.S. patent 4349973 A– Pop-ups and methods of making
  5. A U.S. patent 4146983 A– Promotional pop-up and method of making
  6. A U.S. patent 5022681 A– Paper pop-up devices and method of making the same
  7. A U.S. patent 4192596 A– Camera with improved shutter arrangement
  8. A U.S. patent 3650194 A– Disposable Camera
  9. A U.S. patent 4057813 A– Pocket sized camera

References

  1. ↑ Penick, Ib. "U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014". Ancestry.com. Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  2. ↑ Breslin, Meg (April 24, 1998). "Ib Penick, 67, Designer Of Modern Pop-up Books". tribunedigital-chicagotribune. Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  3. ↑ Kathy, Schaeffer (September 2, 1984). "Pop-up Paper Designs Keep Him Hoppin'". No. Daily Herald Suburban Chicago. p. 32.
  4. ↑ Schaeffer, Kathy (2 September 1984). "Daily Herald Suburban Chicago, September 2, 1984, Page 32". Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  5. ↑ Breslin, Meg (April 24, 1998). "Ib Penick, 67, Designer Of Modern Pop-up Books". tribunedigital-chicagotribune. Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  6. ↑ Sterling, Kate (1 January 1993). "An Interview with the Paterfamilias of Pop-up. Part 1 of 3. Waldo Hunt". Movable Stationery. 10 (1): 15. Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  7. ↑ Breslin, Meg. "Ib Penick, 67, Designer Of Modern Pop-up Books". tribunedigital-chicagotribune. Retrieved 13 December 2016.
  8. ↑ Sterling, Kate (1 January 1993). "An Interview with the Paterfamilias of Pop-up. Part 1 of 3". Movable Stationery. 10 (1): 15.
  9. ↑ Montanaro, Ann R (1993). Pop-up and movable books: a bibliography. Scarecrow Press. pp. 647–948. ISBN 0810837285. OCLC 62681468.