IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF CARD CASES FOR MATCHES AND OTHER ARTICLES
Year: 1874

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by 'Pierre Merlin at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 12th
March 1874.
I, PIERRE MERLIN, of the Firm P. Merlin et Cie, of Marseille,
Manufacturers, do hereby declare the nature of the said. Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF CARD CASES FOR MATCHES AND OTHER
ARTICLES," to be as follows:-
The object of my Invention is a method of manufacturing cardboard
boxes for matches and articles of haberdashery, characterized chiefly by
dispensing with all glueing, by which an important economy is gained
and effected by a peculiar arrangement of hooks. I arrange by this
method of connecting by hooking the various parts, that is to say, the
slide or drawer and the case constituting them, several sorts of boxes, tho.
manufacture of which is performed by two principal operations, viz.,
the cutting of the blanks and the creasing of the folds for the parts to
cut
away to fold and to hook.
I proceed to describe several kinds of boxes manufactured without
glueing, and by simple hooking or rivetting according to my Invention.

page_text: Example No. 1. The box consists of a drawer or box proper and a case.
The drawer blank is first cut and marked for folding before being
hooked into shape with the hooking appendages, which serve to maintain
the edges of the box without glucing, a foot or claw intended to enter
into a slit, and a tongue forming a hook in order to lift the cover when
the box proper is out of the case or slide. The cardboard from which
the case is formed is printed with various decorative devices, and after
the cutting and folding the sanding is applied to the part which forms
the bottom of the box. Besides the hooking appendages the blank com.
prises two overlapping flaps in order to better solidarize the hooking of:
the box. A flap at the front part has for its object to constitute after its
folding an inclined buffer so to speak upon which the tongue of the box
proper or drawer hooks, so as to cause the lifting of the lid when the
drawer is slid from the case for any purpose. The explanation which
I have just given renders it unnecessary to enter into a very detailed
description of the other examples.
Example No. 2. This is a similar box to the last, but the lifting of the
lid is effected by a thread of india-rubber instead of the by tongue before
described.
Example No. 3. The box in this example is composed of a drawer
which consists of two parts, one hooking into the other, in order to form
a drawer with a hooked tongue such as I have already described. The
first part is provided with a hooked tongue which penetrates after folding
into a slit in order to form the lifting medium for the lid as in the
preceding instance. This part also carries a claw which engages into a
slit of the second part, and thus effects the connection of the two parts.
The case proper which receives the drawer just described is bottomless
and is doubled with a covering. This covering forms by its side the
sanded bottom of the drawer, and by its notch it forms the buffer so to
speak against which the hooked tongue acts in order to force the lid up
on the opening of the drawer.
Example No. 4. This example is similar to a snuff-box from its simple
method of opening, and like the others the blank proceeds from the
cutting with the four hooking appendages, a doubled part forms the lid or
cover in which is fixed an india-rubber thread to cause the lid to close
again.
Example No. 5. The drawer of the box of this specimen is composed
of two parts, one of which forms the drawer properly so called, and the

page_text: other constitutes an inner lining provided with two claws or draw pieces,
and two coverings which ensure the matches when the box is opened.
It will be understood that I can form boxes of all sizes and ornament
them in any manner, and I can also arrange this system of box with a
tube without a bottom and a drawer without a hook, the opening being
effected with the aid of the finger. In this case the sanding is applied.
to one side of the drawer.