Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-02-16

groups OF three.
And even If the Government has
given you a patent you may still find
yourself involved in arguments which
NAV carry you all the way to the newly
created Court of Customs and Patent
Appeals, or you may file bill in equity
before any Federal judge and so fight
your way right up to the Supreme Court
itself.
If this should happen, of course. YOU
will not get of with mere $3.50 in fees
to your patent attorney
Is this patent maze too complicated
to encourage the amateur inventor to
proceed with his inventing? "1s 1t true"
I wonder, what one often hears-that
today the poor man has not a chance?"
I will ask Mr.. Robertson, for years the
director for our Government, a man of
great integrity and incompatible ex-
perience.
find tall. distinguished figure with
q beautiful head crowned with silver
hair. put to him my questions. I do
not find him alarmed about the poor
inventor.
Successful inventing is not confined
to the corporation experts" he says. "a
host of Independent inventors have
made fortunes and continue to do so
Among those Of the last i've years are
the Bendix drive used for Automobiles
the semi-soft collar, rubber heels for
shoes, vacuum cleaners and many
Others"
But Gen. Squire goes still further.
Never in the history of the world has
the independent inventor had a better
chance than today" he says.
The best inventor is q tWo-legged
man who eats bacon and eggs. Palatial
laboratories with princely endowments
can hold no monopoly on discovery and
invention. Those laboratories develop
processes and expand inventions. They
do not create new, fundamental in
ventions. The inventor is born alone.
dies alone-and invents alone"
That ne so frequently dies rich, that
the superb houses which shelter him in
death are to be seen in every city in
America, is a knowledge so common
that every other person you meet has
hankering hope that he may sud-
denly make fortune out Of one of
the bright thoughts that float through
his mind while he is going down to
work in the morning.
All the world sometimes seems to me
to be made UP alternately Of those who
think they can invent something and
those who think they can write a play.
With one-Sixteenth of the worlds
population, Americans hold one-half of
the worlds patents. An average of
out Of every $50 among us has ap-
piled for at least one patent
It cannot be something merely in the
air or in the blood which produces so
astonishing fact. Ericsson the Swede,
Bell the Britisher. Berliner the Ger
man. Tesla the Croat, Vanderpoele the
Dutchman, Steinmetz the German,
Pupin the Serb-they made their in
ventions here.
Informed opinion says that it is our
patent system itself, together with the
high quality and standards of its ad-
ministration, which most helps to pro-
duce this situation.
United States System Is Novel.
Moreover, our system is entirely diff
ferent from that of any other country.
We protect the poor inventor during
his days of struggle. An American
does not forfeit his patent because he
he does. He does not have to pay
taxes upon his invention. Elsewhere
he does.
I'm European countries" Commits
sioner Robertson remarked, "even If an
inventor is not making q dollar out of
his patent, he must often pay taxes
which ascend year by year, while, II he
fails to manufacture, some rich man
may step in and use his patented de-
vice without paying the inventor q
cent"
To me, a quite surprising discovery
/ is this-that the very purpose Of our
laws themselves is not to protect poor
inventors into being able to make q
| fortune. On the contrary, our system
was provided for in the very writing OF
the Constitution itself. ito promote the
progress Of science and the useful arts,
or. in the words Of Herbert Hoover, en-
gineer:
"The primary function Of the Patent
once is to stimulate and protect Amer
lean ingenuity and inventiveness."
| It is just one of the happy by-prod-
ucts of noble purpose, apparently
| that brings millions to so many OF the
clever beneflciaries Of this patent maze
These millions go not alone into the
pockets Of the inventors themselves
They often spell enormous savings tC
the public. 1t is estimated. for example
that the invention Of the gas-nlleo
tungsten bulbs saves us billion year
in electric light bills over the cost OF
the old-f1Shioned carbon bulbs. At the
same time, by creating new variations
on the uses for old things and creating
new things to use, our inventors are
the parents of whole industries, spelling
employment for millions.
Dreamer" Inventor Is Gone.
And in the present personality of such
an inventor as Gen. Squier you may
observe how the oldtime picture of Q
long-haired dreamer has faded and dis
appeared out Of reality.
| Like many another famous military
ngure, he is little wisp of man. Like
a bundle of those wires which figure ir
his monophone invention, he. too, is q
bundle of energy. He is all gayety, rerv-
Gus power, conversationally swapping
from great philosophical truth, sue.
cinct in a phrase, to a quip, or an
anecdote. AS a part of his military duty
he once commanded a ship at sea-
snip whose purpose, ofiicially, was to lay
cables to outlandish places, but which
found that that peaceful purpose coulc
be accomplished only after hand-to-
hand contests with savages In southern
and eastern seas.
Inventor and fellow Of learned socie.
ties OF the world, he has also been dip.
lomat-with our embassy in London
SO effective a diplomat that refer my
reader to Volume III of Ambassador
Pages memoirs anent his services. Yet
he remained sufficiently orthodixically
military to serve as chief of the Army
Air Service from 1915 to 1918.
And today. while he off1cially repre-
sents our War Department on the
| United States National Committee or
international Electro Technical Com.
munications," when he goes about
among his friends they forget all that
and think he represents just delightful
gentleman.
Such is the personality Of one live in
ventor as he is. A symbol, If you like
OF the remaining fact that dificult and
technical as this patent maze remains
out of It's ramiflcations is produced a
system which, lying at the core OF
American industrial prosperity, so pro-
tectS the individual inventor that he
| NAV In tho nann ~ Gan Sr,,hinr MNn