Forchheimer v. Franc, Strohmenger & Cowan, Inc.

20 F.2d 553, 1927 U.S. App. LEXIS 2585
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
DecidedJuly 8, 1927
DocketNo. 4547
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 20 F.2d 553 (Forchheimer v. Franc, Strohmenger & Cowan, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Forchheimer v. Franc, Strohmenger & Cowan, Inc., 20 F.2d 553, 1927 U.S. App. LEXIS 2585 (6th Cir. 1927).

Opinions

MOORMAN, Circuit Judge.

This appeal from interlocutory orders of the District Court for the Northern District of Ohio involves validity and infringement of the Langsdorf patent for neckties, No. 1,447,-090, issued upon an application filed April 12, 1922. There are five claims in the patent, the first four of which wore held valid and infringed and the fifth hold invalid. They are set out in the margin.1

Langsdorf’s tie consists of a body or outside portion of silk cut on the bias, a woven fabric resilient lining cut on the bias, and loose stitching connecting the body portion with the lining. These elements are embraced in the claims that were uphold. Claims 1, 2 and 4 specify “a woven fabric resilient lining,” which would seem to include any woven fabric that was resilient, whether cut on the bias or not, and the third claim specifies a woven fabric cut on the bias, apparently covering any woven fabric cut on the bias, whether resilient or not. In the specifications Langsdorf said that his lining was made of woven fabric “cut on the bias,” which is true, though claims 1, 2, and 4 are not so limited, as was decided at the supplemental hearing against the Stern-Merritt [554]*554Company, involving the later product of that company, in which it used a lining not cut on the bias but almost as resilient as the lining it had previously used. The invention, if there is any, resides in claims 2 and 3, which cover the body portion, a woven fabric resilient lining (the resiliency being acquired, if necessary,. by cutting the fabric on the bias), and loose stitching by which the lining and body are connected. The function of the loose stitching is to permit the body portion and lining to stretch and yet to hold them loosely together.

The silk material from which the body portions of ties are constructed has been cut on the bias for many years for the purpose, or at least the partial purpose, of adding to the attractive appearance of the tie. When so cut it has an extensibility that lends itself to the functions of a resilient lining, but it is not claimed that Langsdorf discovered its utility or is entitled to anyo preference in its use. The resilient lining is an element of greater importance and is said to be entirely new in the art. It is mentioned in four of the five claims of the patent and may be said to be implied in the reference in the other to cutting on the bias. Langsdorf claims that he discovered its utility and was the first to use it in neckties. His specifications say that theretofore, in an effort to relieve the tendency to distort the body of the tie, which, because the silk was cut on the bias, was more or less elastic, “inelastic lining had been employed and stitched to the folded portions of the tie particularly throughout the neck portion thereof;” and he claimed that the lining that he proposed'to use, and which he does use, elastic or resilient in its nature, was an innovation in the tie-making art which, when combined with other elements making for utility, would result in a new kind of tie, which when pulled would stretch without breaking the threads and when released would return longitudinally and transversely to its original shape.

The lower court interpreted the patent as covering a lining less elastic than the body of the tie, finding some merit in its functions as so limited. Further than what was referred to in the specifications, as we read them, as á lining certainly as elastic as the body material 'and perhaps more elastic, nothing was said about the degree of resiliency. Resiliency is a relative term, and undoubtedly none of the ties formerly used possessed so much resiliency, either when cut straight or on the bias, as the Langsdorf ties. We are equally sure that some of them did possess a degree of resiliency — enough to come within the phrase “a woven fabric resilient lining.” The ties of Tremmett, Keys and Lockwood and other manufacturers possessed resiliency in the knot-forming part brought about by several folds of the diagonally cut outer portion, or by separate linings of the same material placed in the tie. If the term “woven fabric resilient lining” means something different from the body fabric itself, having distinct and useful qualities, these ties would clearly not anticipate Langsdorf; but if it means any woven resilient fabric inside the outer layer of the tie, there would, we think, be anticipation. Langsdorf does not say in terms, either in his claims or specifications, that he had in mind a lining fabric separate and different from that of the body of the tie, and yet the implication may be fairly said to be found in the detailed description of the specifications.

Prior to Langsdorf many different fabrics had been used for linings — among them nap cotton, or what is known as canton flannel. Heath, No. 335,071, issued January 26, 1886, speaks of an interlining piece of “comparatively stiff, yet soft and pliable material —such as fine linen canvas — which because of its extended form is longitudinally elastic.” There is evidence, without doubt, that the material that Heath used possessed some resiliency, certainly that it was his idea to use a lining which would accommodate itself to the resiliency of the outer part or what he refers to as the “scarf strip * * * cut bias.” If Heath had only supposed that the lining that he described possessed a resiliency that would accommodate itself to the same quality in'the body when in fact it would not, his product could not be considered an anticipation; but the evidence shows that the material that he used was resilient, sufficiently so, we think, to read upon the claim descriptions of that quality in Langsdorf.

Canton flannel had been widely used as a lining and was undoubtedly resilient. The plaintiff’s witness, Dyer, said that a canton flannel lining, if subjected to a pull of ten pounds, would stretch three inches or more— probably as much longitudinal stretching as desirable in a tie — but that a month afterward it would remain stretched about two inches; and while he said that when cut straight it had little or no plastie stretching, we think his evidence, with that of others, shows that when so cut it possessed some degree of resiliency. One of the exhibits in evidence shows a canton flannel lining in one end of the tie running up to the side of the neck and in the other end a light cotton lining running up the same way. The canton flan[555]*555nel part o£ this lining stretches and returns, not of course to the degree that Langsdorf’s lining does, as nothing else in the prior art did, because, if that function had formerly been thought useful, there was no such material as resiline which Langsdorf uses and which, as we shall later see, is largely if not wholly responsible for the success of his ties. Nevertheless there was resiliency, though not so much as in Langsdorf nor in the entire length of the tie;, and the carrying forward of that thought to a greater degree, or the extending of it to other parts of the tie, was not, we think, invention. Railroad Supply Co. v. Elyria Iron & S. Co., 244 U. S. 285, 37 S. Ct. 502, 61 L. Ed. 1136.

The lower court seemingly attached more importance to the loose stitching than to the other elements of Langsdorf’s claims. We think the loose stitching was old, even in neckties, although we are not prepared to say that the exact form used by Langsdorf, though not described in his specifications or claims, had theretofore been used.

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Bluebook (online)
20 F.2d 553, 1927 U.S. App. LEXIS 2585, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/forchheimer-v-franc-strohmenger-cowan-inc-ca6-1927.