Patent Records
name: label: Collection Donor
content: Lindahl, Lisa
label: Collection Donor
content: Miller, Hinda
label: Collection Donor
content: Smith, Polly Palmer
setName: label: See more items in
content: Jogbra, Inc. Records
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1979-2000
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives Center, National Museum of American History
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NMAH.AC.1315, Series 4
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: The patent records consist of patents, correspondence, agreements, notes, and articles about Miller's involvement with the "hard cup project" from 1987 to 2000.   Miller holds six United States Patents: Athletic brassiere (US 4,174,717); Brassiere, (US D259370);  Athletic shirt (US D260,445); Athletic brassiere, US (4,311,150); Brassiere (US D301,518); and Protective brassiere with local energy absorption (US 6,083,080).

Miller and LaJean Lawson, a Portland businesswoman and Oregon State University adjunct professor in exercise science, created a hard cup brassierre designed to reduce the risk of injury to the breasts (US 6,083,080). Lawson also holds a patent for a hard cup brassiere (US 5,022,887) which she assigned to JBI, Inc. in 1990 and later Playtex Apparel, Inc., in 1991. Lawson conducted sports bra research at Oregon State University's biomechanics lab and worked with Champion Jogbra to test and improve sports bra designs.

Some of the correspondence relates to the licensing and manufacturing of hard cup brassieres (US 4,607,640) belonging to LeRoy McCusker and Marc S. Weinberg (US 4,566,458). Miller and Lawson did not license McCusker or Weinberg's  patents and ultimately pursued their own work and patent. The correspondence includes letters and memoranda exchanged with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the law firm of Browdy and Neimark, and with physicians who were asked to test products. Additional documents include agreements regarding ownership of inventions invoices for legal services, projected budgets, a marketing plan, testing notes by Lawson, and formation of the JBI Health Advisory Board comprised of sports medicine and health experts.