Tuttle v. Blow

75 S.W. 617, 176 Mo. 158, 1903 Mo. LEXIS 94
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedJune 20, 1903
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 75 S.W. 617 (Tuttle v. Blow) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Tuttle v. Blow, 75 S.W. 617, 176 Mo. 158, 1903 Mo. LEXIS 94 (Mo. 1903).

Opinion

VALLIANT, J.

This is the second appeal in this-case. It is a suit to foreclose a mortgage, and, ancillary to the main object, the equity powers of the court are invoked to preserve the property by placing it in the hands of a receiver pending the suit and enjoining the defendants from taking certain action calculated to impair the value of the security. Upon the filing of the petition a receiver was appointed and an injunction granted; there were motions by defendants to vacate the order appointing the receiver and to dissolve the injunction, which motions were overruled and an appeal taken. Upon the hearing in this court that appeal was dismissed' and the cause was remanded to the circuit court with directions to proceed to final healing on the merits, first affording defendants leave to file an amended answer. This court on that appeal held that the only question presented by the record in its then condition was, did the circuit court have jurisdiction to make the orders complained of1? and the judgment was that it did have such jurisdiction. [Tuttle v. Blow, 163 Mo. 625.]

When the cause was returned to the circuit court defendant answered and a trial on the merits was had, which resulted in a decree for plaintiffs, from which some of the defendants again appeal.

The mortgage which the plaintiffs seek to foreclose was executed by the defendants, the Blows, September 17, 1889, to secure eight notes made by them of that date, aggregating $25,817.64, bearing eight per cent interest, maturing in series running from eighteen months to eight years, payable to the order of Edwin Curd, wha is the plaintiffs’ assignor.

The property mortgaged is thus described in the granting clause of the instrument: “That said parties of the first part for and in consideration [describing- •' the notes] do by these presents, sell, assign and transfer [167]*167•and set over to the said party of the second part, all their right, title and interest in' a certain trade-mark for eye-salve, which was duly registered in the Patent Office of the United States, by William T. Blow, of St. Lonis, Missouri, and recorded in the Patent Office and declared to be in force for thirty years from 25th February, 1878, which said trade-mark is numbered 1142, and is for the exclusive right for manufacture and sale of T. L. Stephens Chemical Eye-Salve, as also all our right, title and interest in the patent and proprietary right m and to T. L. Stephens Chemical Eye-Salve, provided always this sale, transfer and assignment are upon this express condition, that is to say,” etc. Then follows the condition that the sale is to become void if the notes are paid, otherwise the mortgagee is given the power to sell on ten days ’ notice.

Upon the trial it was shown that William T. Blow in his lifetime owned a secret formula according to which a proprietary medicine called “T. L. Stephens Chemical Eye-Salve” was manufactured and sold iu the market. Although the sale of this article was quite extensive and yielded the proprietor an income of $12,-000 a year, yet the article itself was small and was not of sufficient proportions to require the maintenance of a manufactory, but under the supervision of .one man, Michael Fredericks, employed for that purpose, sufficient quantity of the salve to supply the trade for twelve months was made up and put into condition for sale within six weeks. The salve was put up in small bottles or vials, on each of which was a small label of particular design, and on each box of a dozen vials was a larger label of the same design. This label had been so long used in connection with the salve that it was well known in the market and was a mark by which the article was known to the trade. It thus became the trade-mark of the proprietor of the compound. In 1873, Mr. Blow had this;trade-mark registered in the Patent Office at Washington and received a certificate thereof, [168]*168'as was contemplated in the Act of Congress of 1870 relating to trade-marks. That act was afterwards declared -unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States, and the certificate of registration, therefore, became of no legal effect. Mr. Blow died in 1877 and his widow and two sons, defendants originally herein, became owners of the title that he had owned to the secret formula, the trade-mark and the right to manufacture and sell the proprietary medicine. They continued the business as he had done, with some variations in the business methods, and were doing so down to the time that this suit was instituted, when the receiver took ihe business out of their hands. Under the management of the widow and son's the business does not seem to have been as successful in yielding revenues as it had been in the lifetime of Mr. Blow, although it still yielded the proprietors a large income.

On March 1, 1883, Mrs. Blow borrowed of P. W. Mott $2,000, and of Mrs. Lueders $3,500, and to secure the same made an assignment of her right in this eye-salve and trade-mark to them. In that assignment the thing conveyed was described as a patent-right to manufacture and sell the salve under letters-patent issued by the United States. The instrument was drawn by a man who was not a lawyer and who with the certificate of registration of the trade-mark before him interpreted it to be letters-patent and thus described it:

“Whereas letters-patent, bearing date the 25th day of February, A. D. 1873, were granted and issued by the Government of the United States of America, under the seal thereof, to William T. Blow, of St. Louis, Missouri, for a certain trade-mark for eye-salve, styled ‘Dr. T. L. Stephens Celebrated Chemical Eye-Salve, ’ which patent is No. 1142, and registered February 25, 1873, and to which patent reference is hereby made for a full and particular description of said trade-mark and eye-salve, which is annexed to said letters-patent, by which letters-patent the full and exclusive right and liberty of mak[169]*169ing and using said invention, and of vending the same to others to be used, was granted to the said ¥m. T. Blow, his heirs, executors, administrators and assigns, for the term of thirty years from the date thereof.”

The $2,000 secured by that instrument was after-wards paid, but the $3,500 was unpaid. The parties interested in that mortgage were made parties defendants. When Mr. Curd took the mortgage under which the plaintiffs claim, he knew of the existence of the mortgage in favor of Mr. Mott and Mrs. Leuders. Upon the execution of the mortgage to Curd, and as a part of the transaction, the secret formula under which the eye salve was compounded was given to him in a sealed package. Up to August 16, 1894, the mortgagor had made payments on the Curd debt amounting to $8,-498.94; since that date nothing has been paid on it. There were averments in the petition to the effect that the mortgagors in possession were conducting the business in a manner to indicate that they were endeavoring to realize as much as possible at once and impair the value óf the property, and it was upon that showing that the court appointed a receiver and granted the injunction. The evidence at the trial tended to sustain those averments. When the receiver was appointed the package containing the secret formula was delivered to him and by order of the court he opened it and continued to conduct the business as nearly on the plan that it had theretofore been conducted as good judgment for the interest of all concerned seemed to dictate. Pending the suit William T. Blow, Jr., died, and his administrator has entered his appearance, and also since the suit was begun Benj. E. Blow has transferred to S. H.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
75 S.W. 617, 176 Mo. 158, 1903 Mo. LEXIS 94, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/tuttle-v-blow-mo-1903.