Years ago I bought this book secondhand:
http://www.amazon.com/Century-Color-Louis-Walton-Sipley/dp/B000OM05CCFascinating story about early color photography and the parallel development of color printing. Roughly describing the period before 1950. Early color photography inventions. Color management tuned by chemistry and standards for CMYK printing ink colors. The first color theories and color models. Not to forget the guys that made and tweaked the four color separation films. And way more.
Several pages printed with the processes described in the book. A photo of a dinner in Philadelphia with the brothers Lumière, Stieglitz, brothers Levy (halftone screening inventors), Goldensky, Yarnal Abbott, Beck of the Beck Engraving Company and more important color gurus of that period. Think what it would have been to sit at that table and listen to the conversation.
The first chapter of the book has the title "There is always a background". We shouldn't forget that.
Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst
http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htmJanuary 2016 update, 700+ inkjet media white spectral plots