New York Scaffolding Co. v. Whitney

224 F. 452, 140 C.C.A. 138, 1915 U.S. App. LEXIS 1906
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
DecidedMay 12, 1915
DocketNo. 4215
StatusPublished
Cited by49 cases

This text of 224 F. 452 (New York Scaffolding Co. v. Whitney) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
New York Scaffolding Co. v. Whitney, 224 F. 452, 140 C.C.A. 138, 1915 U.S. App. LEXIS 1906 (8th Cir. 1915).

Opinions

SANBORN, Circuit Judge.

The New York Scaffolding Company, the owner of letters patent No. 959,008, for an improved scaffolding [454]*454supporting means, issued May 24, 1910, to E. H. Henderson, on an application filed June 19, 1909, brought a suit against Egbert Whitney for contributory infringement of claims 1 and 3 of its patent by the manufacture and sale of the hoisting device and the frame thereof described in the patent to Whitney issued July 18, 1911, on an application filed January 28, 1911. There was a decree for the defendant in the court below, which this appeal challenges. The defenses were, first, invalidity of Henderson’s patent on account of (a) anticipation; (b) lack of invention; (c) aggregation, rather than patentable combination; and, second, noninfringement.

Several patents were introduced in evidence to prove anticipation, but it is unnecessary to consider more than two, the patent No-. 382,-252, to Bowyer and C'asperson, for an improvement in painter’s stages, issued May 1, 1888, and the patent to1 William J. Murray, for an improvement in adjustable scaffolds, issued May 28, 1907, for, if neither of these anticipates, there is none, that does. The desideratum sought by Henderson was a simple, economical, and efficient hoisting device and the frame therefor to enable workmen constructing large buildings to raise and lower the scaffolds on which they were working from their stations thereon, so constructed and combined with the cross pieces and floor pieces of the scaffold that the hoisting device and frame would not obstruct any portion of the platform of the scaffold, and that the combination of the hoisting device and its frame with the cross pieces and the floor pieces should be detachable without removing rivets or fastenings of cross pieces to the frame, or of the floor pieces to the cross pieces, to the end that.the combination could be easily and quickly knocked down, removed, and set up again in another place. The principle and the method of combining the mechanical elements by which he reached the result he sought was to locate a hoisting frame, carrying a drum and a shaft gearing therewith operated by a detachable crank, broadside to the wall of the building at the end of each cross piece, so that neither the frame nor its hoisting device, nor the crank, would obstruct any portion of the scaffold when the crank was not in use, to support the cross pieces bearing the floor pieces on the lower ends of the frames, without fastening them thereto, so that they could be removed and replaced without removing or replacing rivets or fastenings.

The means he devised to effectuate the principle of his combination were these: To a drum, borne by the sides of the frame of each hoisting device, a cable, depending from the overhanging portion of an outrigger fastened on the top', or on some other high portion of the building, was attached. The frame of the hoisting device was preferably formed by bending a piece of bar iron into the form of the letter U, the lower end of-which passed around and supported one end of a cross piece without being fastened thereto1. Supported in and extending between the upwardly extended ends of the frame he placed a round bar, which formed the support of the drum to which the cable was fastened. On one end of the drum was a gear wheel, which meshed with a pinion revolubly supported in and between the upwardly extended arms of the frame. This shaft was squared at its. ends, so [455]*455that the crank could be placed on either end without fastening it there, and could be used to drive the pinion and the drum and to raise or lower the scaffold, and then could be removed, without removing any-fastening, in order to avoid any obstruction thereby of the platform of the scaffold. The upper ends of the frame were securely held in place by means of a bolt which extended through and between them. One of these frames, with its hoisting device, was placed at each end of each cross piece, and thus at least four of them were necessary to support and operate a scaffold, and as many more could be used as the size of the building and the extent of the work demanded. The claims in suit are:

“1. A scaffold consisting in the combination of cross beams, floor pieces extending between sueli beams, and a hoisting device associated with each end of each beam, each hoisting device consisting of a continuous TT-shaped inetal bar extending around, the under side of and upward from the associated beam, and a hoisting dram rotatably supported by the side members of such bar.”
“3. A scaffold consisting of a plurality of U-shaped bars arranged in pairs, a cross beam laid in and extending between each pair of such U-shaped bars, a floor laid upon said c-ross-beam, a drum rotatably supported between the upwardly extending side members of each of said U-shaped bars, and means for controlling the rotation of said drum.”

The device patented to Bowyer and Casperson is a painter’s stage, consisting of the combination of a plank, each end of which is supported by a bar secured to the lower ends of the vertical sides of a frame which carries a drum and a shaft operated by a crank and bearing a pinion meshing with gearing on the drum, to which a cable or rope, depending through pulleys and other familiar devices from a hook on the top of the cornice of a building, is attached. By the use of two of these frames and the hoisting devices, painters, by turning the cranks, could operate the drums and raise or lower their staging and themselves.

The patent to Murray discloses an inverted U-shaped frame bearing in and between its vertical sides a dram, to which a depending cable is attached, and a gear wheel on the dram, with which a pinion on a shaft, operated by a crank and supported in and between the vertical sides of the frame, meshes. By turning the crank the frame and hoisting device may be raised and lowered. This patent portrays a pair of these frames and hoisting devices, one at each end of each cross piece, which supports the floor pieces of the scaffold. These frames, however, arc not placed with their broad sides, but with their narrow edges, to the wall of the building, so that the cross pieces used with these devices must necessarily be as much longer than those required for the use with Henderson’s combination as twice the breadth of the frames is greater than twice their thickness, or the frames must be placed over and will obstruct the platform of the scaffold. In the combination of Murray the ends of the cross pieces do not rest unfastened upon the lower bends or bars of the hoisting frames, but they are rigidly secured by rivets or like fastenings to the lower ends of the vertical sides of the frame which supports them, so that, in order to move the scaffold and to use it in another locality, it is necessary to remove the rivets or fastenings and then rivet or fasten [456]*456the cross pieces and frames together again, or to remove a cross beam with the two hoisting devices and their frames fastened thereto in one cumbersome mass.

[1] Do the combinations of Bowyer and Casperson, and of Murray, anticipate and annul the patent of the combinations of claims 1 and 3 of Henderson’s patent? His patent is for a combination. It is not for. a new machine, or for new mechanical elements, but for a new way of combining old mechanical elements.

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Bluebook (online)
224 F. 452, 140 C.C.A. 138, 1915 U.S. App. LEXIS 1906, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/new-york-scaffolding-co-v-whitney-ca8-1915.