The Opelousas courier., 1893-11-04
PRIZES ON PATENTS.
How TO Get Twenty-Five Hun
dred Dollars for Nothing.
The Winner has a Clear Gift OF
Small Fortune, and the Losers
Have Patents that may.
Bring them in Still
More.

Would you like to make twenty-five hun
dollars? If you would, read carefully what
follows and you may see a way to do it.
The Press Claims Company devotes much
attention to patents. 1t has handled thous-
ands of applications for inventions, but it
would like to handle thousands more. There
is plenty of Inventive talent at large in this
country, needing nothing but Encouragement
to produce practical results. That encourage
ment the Press Claims Company proposes to
give.
NOT SO HARD AS IT SEEMS.
pallingly formidable thing. The idea is that
an inventor must be a natural genius, like
Edison or Bell that he must devote years to
delving in complicated mechanical problems
and that be must spend a fortune on delicate
experiments before he can get a new device
to a patentable degree of perfection. This
dolusion the company desires to dispel. 1t
desires to get into the head of the public a
clear comprehension of the fact that it is not
the great, complex, and expensive inventions
that bring the best returns to their authors,
but the little, simple and cheap ones-the
things that seem so absurdly trivial that the
average citizen would feel somewhat ashamed
of bringing them to the attention OF the
Patent Office.
Edison says that the profits he has received
from the patents on all his marvellous inyen-
tions have not been sufficient to pay the cost
Va hfo Va Dub wv IAN II NVi
ceived the idea of fastening a bit of rubber
cord to a child's ball, so that it would come
back to the hand when thrown, made a for
tune out of his scheme. The modern sewing
machine is a miracle of ingenuity-the pro
duct of the toll of hundreds of busy brains
through a hundred and fifty years, but the
whole brilliant result rest upon the simple
device of putting the eye of the needle at the
point instead of at the other end.
THE LITTLE THINGS THE MOST VALU-
ABLE.
Comparatively few people regard them
selves as inventors, but almost everybody has
been struck, at one time or another, with
ideas that seemed calculated to reduce some
of the little ~frictions of life. Usually such
ideas are dismissed without further thought.
"Why don't the railroad company make it's
car windows so that they can be slid up and
down without breaking the passengers
backs?" exclaims the traveller. "If | were
running the road l would make them i'm such
a way"
"What was the man that made this sauce
pan thinking off" grumbles the cook. "He
never had to work over a stove, or he would
have known how it ought to have been
fixed"
Hang such a collar button ~ growls the
man who is late for breakfast. elf / were in
the business I'd make buttons that wouldn't
slip out, or break of, or gouge out the back
of my neck"
And then the various sufferers forget about
their grievances and begin to think of some
thing else. If they would sit down at the
next convenient opportunity, put their ideas
about car windows, saucepans, and collar
buttons into practical shape, and then apply
for patents, they might find themselves as
Independently wealthy as the man who in
vented the iron umbrella ring, or the one
who patented the fifteen puzzle.
A TEMPTING OFFER.
To induce people to keep track of their
bright ideas and see what there is in them,
the Press Claims Company has resolved to
offer u prize.
To the person who submits to it the
simplest and most promising inven-
ton, from a commercial point of view,
the company will give twenty-five
hundred dollars in cash, in addition to
refunding the fees for securing the
It will also sdvertise the invention
rec of charge.
This offer is subject to the following condi
ions:
Every competitor must obtain q patent for
lis invention through the company. He must
apply for preliminary search, the cost of
which will be five dollars. Should this search
how his invention to be unpatentable, he can
without further expense. Other
wise he will be expected to complete his APP
'~lication and take out a patent in the regular
way. The total expense, including Govern
nent and Bureau fees, will be seventy dol
ars. For this, whether he secures the prize
IT not, the inventor will have a patent that
'ught to be a valuable property to him. The
will be awarded by a jury consisting of
hree reputable attorneys of Washington.
Intending competitors should fill out the fol-
owing blank, and forward it with their appli-
alton: I
" snhmit the within descr;had ;,,on+;o,