Patent ID: 7237782

Claim:
A wheeled shopping cart, comprising: a frame defining a wheeled base and a pair of sidewardly spaced frame elements rigidly joined to the base and projecting upwardly adjacent a rear of said cart; an upwardly opening basket supported on said base and rigidly joined to said frame, said basket including front, right and left side walls projecting upwardly from a perimeter of a bottom wall; a handle supported on and extending transversely between said frame elements at a location adjacent a rear upper edge of said basket; and a rear gate assembly hingedly supported on said frame for vertical swinging movement between suspended and raised positions, said gate assembly in said suspended position being in a generally upright orientation wherein it is disposed at and substantially closes off an upright rear side of said basket and is swingably supported on a cross shaft which extends transversely across the cart and is located adjacent a rear upper edge of said basket; said rear gate assembly including (a) a monolithic one-piece platelike molded plastic gate member having height and width dimensions so as to substantially close off the upright rear side of the basket when the gate assembly is in the suspended position, said gate member in said suspended position having an upper edge disposed closely adjacent the handle and a lower edge disposed closely adjacent a rear edge of the bottom wall of said basket, (b) a rigid one-piece connecting frame disposed primarily adjacent a rear side of said gate member and including a hinge part adjacent an upper edge of said gate member and defining a vertically hinged connection with said cross shaft, (c) said rigid connecting frame adjacent an upper end thereof including a transversely extending channel structure which is engaged over and confines the upper edge of said gate member therein, and (d) a connecting part connected between said rigid connecting frame and said gate member at a location spaced downwardly from said upper edge to fixedly join said connecting frame and said gate member.