Nieman v. Plough Chemical Co.

22 F.2d 73, 1927 U.S. App. LEXIS 3275
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
DecidedOctober 14, 1927
Docket4784
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 22 F.2d 73 (Nieman v. Plough Chemical Co.) 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
Nieman v. Plough Chemical Co., 22 F.2d 73, 1927 U.S. App. LEXIS 3275 (6th Cir. 1927).

Opinion

*74 KNAPPEN, Circuit Judge.

This controversy concerns the rights of the respective parties to the use of the trade-mark or trade-name “Black and White,” as severally used by them.

On February 18, Í921, appellant applied for registration of a trade-mark “Black and White” for printed books and pamphlets in series (the first stated use thereof being February 1, 1921), and certificate of registration No. 148,495 was granted her November 15, 1921. On August 25 of that year appellee applied for registration of an alleged trade-mark “Black and White” for books, later amended to read “Black and White for books, namely, almanacs, issued annually, Birthday and Dream Books.” An interference (No. 47,897) was declared between appellant’s registered trade-mark and appellee’s application. The examiner, the Commissioner of Patents, and the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia having successively held that appellee was not entitled to registration of its mark, the bill in this cause was' filed by appellee under section 4915 of the Revised Statutes (U. S. C. S. 1916, § 9460 [35 USCA § 63]), 1 praying decree declaring its right to registration and directing issue of certificate thereof. Defendant answered, denying appellee’s asserted right to registration, and counterclaimed for infringement' of her registered trade-mark, asserting unfair competition with respect to her earlier common-law rights. Upon final hearing on pleadings and proofs, the District Court found that plaintiff had not sustained the burden of showing priority of right to use the words “Black and White Series” on almanacs, dream books, etc. The court also held that plaintiff appellee had not infringed appellant’s statutory trade-mark nor her common-law trade-mark or trade-name. 2 The bill of complaint was accordingly dismissed, as was defendant’s counterclaim upon both branch- , es. Plaintiff did not appeal. This review is had upon defendant’s appeal from dismissal of her counterclaim.

As early as 1900 (apparently in 1902 or 1903), Hennegan & Co., printers and lithographers at Cincinnati, Ohio, began publishing a pamphlet called “Black and White Dream Book,” of an issue bearing a publication date 1900; about one-half was devoted to the “True Interpretation of Dreams” (the subjects of such dreams being alphabetically arranged), the remainder of the pamphlet, being almost entirely given up to the subjects of “palmistry,” “fortune telling,” “curious games of cards,” “Moles,” “telling fortunes by grounds of a tea and coffee cup,” and “signs and omens.” The pamphlet carried no advertisements and bore Hennegan’s imprint. The book took its name from the fact that it was originally put out as “show printing” for one Boone, a “mind reader and hypnotist,” calling himself a “Mahatma,” one of whose “color schemes” (applied to show printing, costumes, and horses used in one of his acts) was black and white. Its subject-" matter was in large part in the language used in “The Gypsy Fortune Teller Dream Book and Treasury of Lucky Numbers,” by “Madam Juno, the Gypsy Queen,” apparently published in 1887. The “Dream Book” was sold by Boone, and after his death by showmen of the same general type, including Galvani and Madame > Frimie, during performances in opera houses and tents.

Until 1912 books of this character were also sold by Hennegan to promoters of mail order business generally. From 1912 to 1919, at least, that company sold the old “Black and White Dream Book” (1900) in large quantities to appellant exclusively, but still under the Hennegan imprint; and from 1919 to 1921 printed in the name of the Van Publishing Company, Cincinnati, of which appellant was proprietor, a “Dream Dictionary,” containing in principal substance the “Dream Interpretations” published in the old Black and White Dream- Book, but omitting the other .features' hereafter enumerated. This “Dream Dictionary” of 1919 to 1921 did not purport to be a Black and 'White publication, nor did it contain the words “Black and White.” Presumably such trade-mark rights as appellant had derived from Hennegan were not intended by appellant to be abandoned. In 1921 Hennegan printed in the name of the Van Publishing Company a series of six volumes, viz.: (1) A “Dream Dictionary,” which was almost entirely a reprint (with exceptions hereafter mentioned) of the Dream Dictionary before referred to as printed from 1919 to 1921; (2) “Marriage” (Nos. 1 and 2 had been prepared between 1919 and 1921); (3) “What is in Your Life;” (4) “The Little Wonder Fortune Teller;” (5) “Character Reading;” and (6) “Magnetism.” All six of these volumes so *75 put out in 1921 were marked “Black and White Series” at tbe top of both front and back pages, tbe volumes being in both places numbered respectively, from 1 to 6. They carried no advertisements, except one of a so-called “Wizard Fortune Wheel” put out by appellant. Hcnnogan’s Black and White Dream Book had carried no advertisements. These six “Black and White Series” volumes were continuously published from 1921.

Meanwhile, in 1917, and thus before tbe first publication by appellant of a “Black and White Series,” under that imprint, appellee, whose business was that of a manufacturing chemist and manufacturer of toilet preparations, - proprietary medicines and food products, adopted and began to use the label (and alleged trade-name) “Black and White” on its line of medicinal and toilet articles, and possibly other lines, which label it has since continuously used.

In 1919 appellee, as part of an advertising system for the sale of its products, began putting out paper pamphlets, such as “almanacs and dream books,” etc., which it sent to its customers in large quantities, and which tbe latter could give away or sell, as they might prefer — a price of 25 cents being marked on tbe pamphlet. In 1923, and thus six years after appellee began the use of its trade-name “Black and White” as applied to its line of manufactured products, and four years after appellee’s publications began, Hennegan & Co. gave appellant a written assignment of the trade-mark (or trade-name) “Black and White.” Hennegan & Co. bad no registered trade-mark.

Appellant asserts that Hennegan & Co. actually sold her the trade-mark when she bought tbe goods purchased in 1912. The trial judge, who saw and heard nearly all the witnesses, including appellant, found that “no such assignment was in fact made until the written assignment, which is 1923.” The judge considered that appellant’s use was simply that she bought the 100,000 or less of these Black and White Dream Books, 3 and disposed of them, and that at that time she had no idea of establishing a trade-mark, and that, in his opinion, she could not in fact have established such trade-mark, because tbe use was neither indicative of excellence of selection, high quality of printing, or any other attribute which she had or which she exercised, as distinguished from the uncopyrighted contents of the book.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
22 F.2d 73, 1927 U.S. App. LEXIS 3275, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nieman-v-plough-chemical-co-ca6-1927.