G. W. J. Murphy Co. v. Metal Stamping Co.

214 F. 382, 1914 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1815
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedMay 8, 1914
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 214 F. 382 (G. W. J. Murphy Co. v. Metal Stamping Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
G. W. J. Murphy Co. v. Metal Stamping Co., 214 F. 382, 1914 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1815 (E.D.N.Y. 1914).

Opinion

CHATFIELD, District Judge.

The present action is complicated by the joinder of charges of unfair competition, brought in this court because of diversity of citizenship of the parties, with allegations of [383]*383infringement of a trade-mark registered November 21, 1911, and with allegations of infringement of a patent issued to George W. J. Murphy, on the 7th of May, 1907, No. 853,206, upon an application filed April 2, 1906. These letters patent have been duly assigned to the plaintiff company.

[1] The registered trade-mark is merely a circle surrounding the letter “M,” and the application for registration states that it has been used since 1909. This trade-mark was taken out by this company, and has been used by them since that time upon its goods generally; but it also appears by the testimony that for certain large customers and to fill certain special orders the goods have been placed upon the market without the “M,” and with a small circle or dot in its place.

[2] The articles, about the sale of which the present controversy has arisen, are curtain fasteners, and the Murphy patent states that they are “for carriage curtains and the like.” The testimony shows that for at least 20 or 30 years fasteners of sheet metal or brass, with a button of ovoid or irregular shape, and capable of being turned so that the longest axis will rest across or at right angles to the long sides of the buttonhole, or opening through which the button is passed, have been used upon carriage covers, and in similar" places, like baby-carriage hoods, awnings, etc. Varieties of attachment by rivet, by a single screw, by a plate attached with smaller screws or by prongs (penetrating the material if cloth or leather and bent up on the underside), are old, and are selected merely according, to the place in which the button or fastener is to be used. An eyelet or buttonhole has always been provided, whether for the insertion of a round button head or for a turnable head-with one axis longer than the other. The use of the ovoid or long head made possible and desirable the employment of- a metal or durable eyelet instead of the flexible buttonhole for a round button. Whether or not this eyelet should have a back plate, and whether it should be fastened by prongs through the curtain, to be bent over this back plate or after insertion through holes in the back plate, or in fact whether the eyelet should be sewed or crimped to the curtain, like grommets, were details of construction involving no novelty or invention and chosen because of their convenience or applicability to the use desired.

Larger sizes and greater numbers of covers, through the use of the automobile, motor boat, etc., have increased enormously the number of curtain fasteners needed in the past few years. Another need arose from the excessive strain due to the speed of the automobile and the constant flapping or working of the curtain, with the resultant wear and strain upon the button. Also the advantage of fastening two, or three curtains with one button, and resisting flapping strains from all at the same time, has been met by elongating, the shank or shaft of the fastener. The difficult circumstances under which curtains were hastily applied, and the use of automobiles at night, made desirable a fastener or button which, with careless or hurried handling, would assume a fixed position, and would, -if only partially turned, spring into a locked position, or else return to the point of starting, thus avoiding the liability of being placed in an insecure position when strain was [384]*384put upon the curtain by movement of the machine or by wind, thus allowing the curtain to come off from the button, or allowing the button to be forced back to the starting position.

A button that could not, without extreme care, be left at an intermediate position, would be more likely to be properly placed by one in a hurry. Some such considerations led various manufacturers, including the defendant, to place upon the market fasteners with a turn button, for use upon carriages (before the great demand from automobile manufacturers arose) under what have been put in evidence as the Reed & Packard patent, No. 43,928, August 23, 1864, the Snell patent, No. 393,592, November 27, 1888, and Curtis patent, No. 289,991, December 11, 1883, in which the stud has, upon the face against which the button presses, transverse grooves or notches into which a ridge or rib on the lower side of the turn button will be forced by a spring in the head or on the shaft of the turn button, and the Curtis patent, as early as 1883, had the metal eyelet for use in strengthening the buttonhole or slit in the curtain.

It was evident that in all such devices the pressure of the curtain or eyelet, whether constant or intermittent when flapping, is exerted against the spring which holds the button head into the notches, or against the end of the stud, and if this pressure be sufficient to lift the head out of the notch, a button head that will turn easily may, under such pressure, be worked from one position to the other by the strain upon the curtain. This difficulty could not be met by increase in the strength of the spring, nor by any intricate, method of locking, because of the small size of the head of the button, which has to be turned with the fingers, and the need of making application easy. In the generally accepted form of button, therefore, two depressions or grooves are now made in the face of the eyelet into which the ends of the rib or lower side of the button head will fall or rest, when the button head is turned across the eyelet or in locked position.

It is manifest that the necessity (as well as the means) for causing the button head to assume a pertain position, under all circumstances, as a guard against carelessness in operating, is distinct from the necessity or means of holding, the button head in the locked position. But the strain of the curtain may produce the tendency to turn back to the unlocked position, whether the possibility of so doing arises from carelessness in placing the button or from the ability of the wind pressure to lift the button head against the spring holding it in the groove.

The use of means to always seat the button head in a proper position is protection against carelessness in setting when the wind pressure occurs. The means for locking or preventing the head from turning is a safeguard against the results of the wind pressure in its tendency to turn the button head, even though the button head may have been properly placed at the outset; The grooves or depressions in the eyelet have the effect of holding the rib or convex portion of the under surface of the button head more firmly against turning from the crosswise or locked position, in direct proportion to the increase in pressure of the curtain with the eyelet against the button head. The renewal of such pressure when a curtain is flapping produces but a succession [385]*385of similar strains, if these grooves and depressions in the eyelet are large enough so that the button head must each time the curtain flaps, find itself within the depressions of the grooves. A proper proportioning of the parts allows the same protection and accomplishes these results even when the shank or stud of the button is lengthened, and provides for two or three curtains to be held by the same fastener, whether' one, two, or three of the curtains is in place.

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Bluebook (online)
214 F. 382, 1914 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1815, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/g-w-j-murphy-co-v-metal-stamping-co-nyed-1914.