The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-11-10

Steps are now being taken for the erection of fitting monument to the genius of American Invention. It will be in the form of the finest building in the world devoted exclusively to the protection of inventors. The United States patent office is about the only bureau of the Federal government that more than pays it's, own way. The fees 1t collects for protecting inventors have served to render 1t a money nak- ing institution. It has coliectedly nearly S7000,o0O more than the cost of operating the bureau.
 The Commissioner of Patents regards it as a little unfair to inventors that the government should make money out of it's business with them, especial ly if it refuses to appropriately house that business. He thinks that this seven million dollars of inventors money now in the. United States treasT ury ought to be taken to build the patent office a fitting home of It's own--it now resides in. a building shared by the Department of the In- terior, where both are crowded unduly
 Furthermore, the Commissioner points out. the end of the direct profit which the government gets out of the business of protecting inventors IS no- where in sight. Last year be.5zJ patents were applied for. and S6.000 were granted. The number of appliy cations has approximately doubled in eighteen years Tn all there have been 9o2, ,000 patents issued by the govern ment If the records of the patent office could speak, what tales of suc- cess and failure they would tell!
 Some years ago there walked into the patent office a bashful. Erimy, coal miner In a halting manner he told oF HA Yntnara HA was making his living 'tin a hole Tn the ground" in western, Pennsylvania. He wanted to get married. but was not willing to ask his sweetheart tn marry him while he was making so precarious a living. He was not will ing to take chances of forcing her to substitute with widows weeds the bright colors that matched her face and nature.
 So he had set to work to invent a nutIock for railroad fishplates. He had solved the problem. and came to Washington as a brakeman on coal train in the hope that his nutloek might pull him out of that hole in the ground" Would the examiner help him? He had no money to throw away on lawyers. and would the ex- amfner tell him what he honestly thought of it? Of course the exanin- CT would It was no good-had been patented by someone else. Then q different lock was pulled from an other pocket This was a good one, The examiner drew up his specified tions. and got a lawyer to make the application gratis. The patept was started on its way, sand the inventor worked his way back to western Penn sylvania.
 Several years passed One bright morning that same examiners door opened, and in walked a spruce young fellow. apparently not well educated. but certainly bearing the ear-marks of prosperity. He wanted to know whether the examiner remembered him. The examiner did not. Well" replied the stranger. I'm the fellow you pulled out of that hole in the ground and Susie and I are on our honeymoon" Where is Susie" " 'She's out there in the hall. too bash ful to come in, but I'll bring her" Suiting action to word he soon pulled the blushing little bride into the pres ence of the examiner. She modestly stammered her thanks for the great service he had done them, and, to this day the official likes to recall his part in the successful romance.
 Upon another occasion there came into the patent office an impoverished young chap who had staked his last cent on a trip to Washington to get a patentso on an aluminium tip for horse shoes, intended to be used in shoeing race horses. The examiner looked it over, and informed the young fellow that he was trying to patent some thing which someone else had already patented, but that he had one idea in 1t that could be used with another principle The examiner helped him draw up the specifications and gave