The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1914-01-20
MAKING MONEY ON
PATENTS DIFFICULT
How Prejudice Holds Back
the Sales of Inventions
Is Discussed.

To invent a successful device is one
thing; 10 make money out Of il is an
other writes Waldcmar Kaempffret in
recent issue of the Outlook. 1t is no
easy matter to sell an invention that
means change in time honored way
of manufacturing bedposts or of boil.
ing eggs. The man who invented the
vacuum cleaner had to fight rusty
household conservatism that found the
old broom "good enough Try and
kick up something new and you are
bound to stub your toe against the
brick concealed beneath the high hat
of prejudice.
II takes as much ingenuity to mar
ket an invention as to create 1t. just
how that ingenuity shall he exercised
depends much upon the character of
the invention. 4 loom that costs 500.
900 10 manufacture cannot be sold rs
if il were a breakfast food. There may
be only fifty possible buyers in the
whole country, and of these perhaps
not ten could write check for the pur.
chase price.
That situation is encountered time
and time again. It was encountered,
for example, during the building Of
the Chicago drainage canal. Contract
ors who bid on rock excavation were
told that their tenders must not exceed
so cents a cubic yard. Rock mad never
been oIcavated before at that price un-
der the same conditions. The appar-
emily impossible could be accomplished
by combination of two inventions
the galloway and the cantilever, later
used with success at Panama. OF these
the cantilever cost S2S,00Q. Few con.
tractors could afford to pay that sum.
Accordingly the manufacturer leased
the machine, with the result that con
tractors ultimately excavated rock at 56
cents a cubic yard, the state OF Illinois
saved about S5,000,000, and the manu-.
facturer made more money ont of his
machines than if he had sold them out
right.
Leasing is probably the most ap.
proved business method of placing
complicated machine on the market
The most important machines used in
shoe manufacturing are welters and
stitchers. These are leased and never
sold-leased, moreover, on such condi-
tions that the welter may not be used
with q competing stitcher, nor the
stitcher with competing welter.
About 5a4 cents for every pair Of
shoes made by these machines is paid
by shoe manufacturers in royalties. In
addition to the welter and stitcher, the
shoe machinery patentees place at the
disposal of The shoe manufacturer
some twentysix auxiliary machines
which he may or mey not use as he
sees fit, and for which only nominal
rental is charged, varying from 81 to
s35 year-barely enough TO pay for
wear and tear. These auxiliary ma.
chimes, however. may not be used unless
the welter and stitcher are leased.
Such "tryingn clauses in leases were
invented long before the modern trust
was conceived. Although their legality
is now being subjected 10 judicial scru.
tiny under the sherman law. il cannot
be denied that the leasing system has
enabled many a poor man who could
not afford to buy machinery to engage
in shoe manufacturing with little cap
ital
In the testimony taken in the now
famous DIck-Henry case we learned
of still another method OF marketing
patented machinery, q method which
consists in selling device at less than
cost and compelling the purchaser to
huy from the manufacturers whatever
supplies may be necessary to operate
the device. If supplies bought in the
open market are used the patent is in
fringed. because the inventor or his
assignee has the exclusive constitu-
i tionaI Tlght TO use the macnlne IN any
way that he himself sees fit and has
permitted the purchaser TO use the ma
chine only in certain prescribed wav
So the courts have held time and time
again in eases long before Dick VS.
Henry aroused comment
In patent-infringemeut suit involv-
ing the Mergenthaler linotype the
brilliant Judge Coke went out OF his
way 10 comment on the crudity Of
epoch making inventions and the svs.
tematic Improvements necessary before
they could be commercially introduced
Not only was the Morse telegraph a fl
subject for a museum within a few
months after lis first feeble success.
but the Howe sewing machine. he an.
noupced from the bench. could not he
successfully used by anv woman for
ten years after the patent was grant.
ed. Yet both Morse and Howe are de.
servedly regarded as great American in.
ventors.-Trov Times.