Decision Relating to Patents

U. S. Circuit Court--District of Connecticut

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Celluloid Manufacturing Company V. Comstock Cheney &Company Hyatt Patent-Celluloid Covering For Piano Keys Shipman, J. It has always been the law that a patentable invention, although new and useful, must be the result of something more than and different from mechanical skill. The existence of novelty and utility in a patented thing has been potent in the determination of the question of its patentability. (McCormick v. Seymour, 2 Blatchf., 240 ; Furbush v. Cook, 2 Fisher, 288 ; Mid- dleton Tool Co. v. Judd, 3 Fisher, 141.) The decision in Hollister v. Benedict&Burnham Manufacturing Company (113 U. S., 59; S. C., 5 Sup. Ct. Rep., 717) makes independent evidence of the existence of inventive skill, apart from inferences of such existence which may be drawn from novelty and utility, to be of greater importance than has been understood heretofore. There was the creative faculty of invention in the abandonment of the ineffectual and mechanical attempt to make single celluloid keys in imitation of ivory single keys, and in the conception of the idea of covering a whole keyboard with a single celluloid sheet. The patent in suit having been declared void for want of novelty by another court (Celluloid Manufacturing Company v. Tower, 26 Fed. Rep., 451), from which decision a notice of appeal to the Supreme Court had been .given, a stay of the accounting was asked in this case ; but as the facts in this case had features not brought out in the other case, held that there was no adequate reason for a stay of the accounting. Motion for rehearing denied. A Sweet Posy. Take two moss rosebuds, half open, a spray of rosemary, and half a dozen of the flower heads of lavender, to which add a cluster or two of mignonette, three old clove carnations, a small bunch of white jasmine, and a few leaves of the sweet scented verbena (Aloysia dtHodora). If to the above you add a half opened old Provence or cabbage rose, so muchthe better; and the result will be a sweet posy that a duchess might like to have near- her , and which - if tastefully put together, will delight the eyes as well as the nose. This sort of sweet posy was far more common II the days of our great-grandmothers than now. You will notice how careful the late R. Caldecott was to give his sweetest of early eighteenth century maids a dainty little posy to sniff at as they cross their tiny feet and sit demurely II the fine old Chippendale chairs he must have liked, or he would not have drawn them so well. Well made pot pourri i s delicious in winter, but during summer tune every room II every house which has a garden ought to be full of fresh flower fragrance, leaving the mummied odors for the winter of our discontent. You must not for a moment fancy that the above recipe for a sweet posy is a bit of literary labor out of my own head, so to say. The truth is, I found it written inside the cover of an old herbal, and to-day I tested its efficiency, and having found it not wanting, I offer it to every Lady Corisande who reads the ar- den. The capital stock of the American Bell Telephone Company is ten millions of dollars ; and the capital stock of the various sub or license companies is fifty- four millions of dollars, or in all sixty-four millions of dollars. The Bell stock sells in market at nearly double its face value. The aggregate of the license companies' stock sells for about one-half its face value.

SA Supplements Vol 22 Issue 564suppThis article was published with the title “Patents” in SA Supplements Vol. 22 No. 564supp (), p. 264
doi:10.1038/scientificamerican10231886-9014dsupp

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