The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1895-09-18

There have recently been several i'm
portant decisions in the United States courts
regarding centrifugal cream. separator pa.
tent rights which are deserving of the at
tention OF those interested in any way in
these machines.
United States circuit court for the northern
district OF New York, at Canandaigua N.
Y, granted a decree, inclusive Of a per-
petual injunction. sustaining the material
claims of the Won Bechtolsheim patent,
better and commercially known as the
Alpha De Laval patent, in the suit OF
the De Laval Separator Company of New
York against Samuel Hotchkiss of Della
ware county, N. Y, who had been making
and selling cream separator with an in
9 rior bowl device, thus held to infringe the
!" Alpha patent as charged by the De
Following this decision, Judge Wallace
sitting in the United States court at SYRIA
cuse, N. Y, on August 20, granted an in
junction against John Houston OF Hamden,
Delaware county, n. Y, an owner and user
Of one of the so-called Hotchkiss separators
which injunction restraints Houston from
the further use of such machine
These decisions are of no little interest to
creamerymen and dairymen, and, for that
matter, to the public generally, since it is
maintai led that the centrifugal cream sepa-
rator, which has already revolutonized the
existing conditions of the separation OF
cream from milk, is soon to be introduced
in form for household use, that we may
perhaps grind the cream for our coffee
as we now do the coffee itself.
The centrifugal separator patents have
long been in litigation. The De Laval
Company was practically the pioneer in the
introduction of these machines, but of late
years various concerns previously making
gravity cream-setting appliances have taken
up the manufacture of the centrifugal ma
oh inn T1a No
has bitterly resented this trespass upon its
claimed rights, and infringement proceed
ings under its patents, in which it claims to
have invested and expended nearly a
million dollars, have been brought in sew
eral states.
In its later machines the De Laval Com
pany has practically abandoned the older
types OF separator construction and now
uses what is termed the Alpha process,
consisting of an interior device dividing the
milk in the revolving separator bowl. 1t is
this new and improved Alpha" patent
which the United States courts now sustain,
and hold other machines to infringe in the
use OF bowl dividing appliances. The SUBJ
Ject thus becomes one OF considerable i'm
portance to users of separators, both those
who may already be using some possibly in
ringing machine, and those contemplating
the purchase of separator.
1t is not definitely known how broad the
scope OF the present decisions may be as
regards their immediate bearing upon the
| IN an ufacture and use OF asserted infringing
machines other than the ones specifically
sued upon in these actions, but 1t will
not be amiss for buyers to be careful in this
respect.
| 1t will be noted that in the decisions
rendered the user is held equally respon-
| sibe with the manufacturer and In simple
protection of self-interests any purchaser of
an appliance, the subject of pending litiga-
| ton or likely to be involved in costly in
fringement proceedings, should exercise due
! caution
Patent litigation has now become 80
tedious and necessarily of such long and
uncertain duration, In addition to the enor-
nous expense to which 1t subjects contest
ants, that many manufacturers are, in a
moral sense at least, criminally negligent in
their indifference to existing patent rights
possibly infrnged by them, and are often
times enabled to continue sufficiently long
to withdraw with their profits, or effect a
compromise Of their own direct RESPONSE
| bility, and leave the usually innocent user
! to make paration.-American Dairyman.