Evening star., 1932-04-11
DEDICATION HELD
AT PATENT OFFICE
New Home Formally Opened
in Presence of Inventors,
Lawyers and Officials.

The new home of the United States
Patent Office, a unit of the s17,5o0,O0o
Commerce Department Building, today
was formally dedicated in the presence
of a score or more Of this countrys s
leading inventors and hundreds of pat
ent law attorneys and friends of the
bureau which has been functioning for
142 years
A message of greeting from President
Hoover and speeches by Thomas Ewing,
president of the American Patent Law
Association: Secretary of Commerce
Lamont and Patent Commissioner
Thomas E. Robertson featured this
mornings program of the celebration,
which is being sponsored by a national
committee composed of manufacturing
and scientific groups, under the leader
ship OF H. H. Dykes of New York.
President Cites Benefits.
In his message President Hoover said: /:
"Our patent system has been so bene-
fetal in carrying out the constitutional
purpose of promoting the progress of
science and the useful arts that
Abraham Lincoln, classed the discovery
of America, the invention of printing
and the establishment of the patent
system as three incidents in the history
of the human race that were of pre-
eminent consequence"
Commissioner Robertson gave an in
tereSting account of the history of the
Patent Office and in conclusion said no
other country has shown such inventive
progress as America. So many patents
have been granted in this country, he
said, for primary nventions-inventions
That hoHgo ho la+
one would conclude that we are more
inventive than citizens of other coun-
tries.
That this is doubtful" he added,
'1s indicated by inventions made by
citizens of foreign birth Their inven-
tions we're not made in their native
countries but were made after their
arrival in this country, the very atmos-
phere created by our patent system
seeming to have spurred them on to
make inventions that have made tbs q
known throughout the civilized world"
Lamont Answers Critics.
Secretary Lamont, after reading the
Presidents message, came out in de-
fense of the Patent Office
In these times" Mr.. Lamont said,
''when industry and commerce are at
low ebb. when the daily press for
months have recorded declining orders,
increase in surplus and inventories of
raw materials, disappearing profits and
dividends. it is pleasure to record one
industry that is running 100 per cent
capacity, with plenty of orders ahead.
a decline in inventory or surplus of raw
materials, but sufficient on hand to
keep the plant going at the present rate
for many months.
tTr1 AA Ir l,1- s,,
It's new quarters the Patent Office has
turned out 12.773 patents, an increase
of 8 per cent over the average for the
preceding year with the same force. At
the high point in 1880 there were
10000 applications awaiting official
action.
AS of April this number had been
reduced to 10000 At the present rate
1t will still require some time to bring
the work ahead of the Office to a rea-
sonably satisfactory basis The office
Will pay into the Treasury about s4.500.-
600 by the end of the present fiscal
year"
EulOgiZes Patent Office.
Mr.. Ewing was the third speaker on
the mornings program and in his
eulogy Of the Patent Office he declared
the work it is called to Go is to pass
upon the best thoughts OF all workers
In all fields Of endeavor to enlarge
mans physical capabilities.
He urged friends of the Patent Office
TO see to 1t that this bureau be brought
up and kept up to the point of eff
cheney demanded by the magnitude, the
oncuIty ana the importance of the
task imposed upon it."
Although it is now housed in one of
the finest Office structures IN the world,
equipped with all the modern improve
ments known to the art, and manned
by a personnel numbering 1,400, in
cluding TOO expert examiners, the