Crown Cork & Seal Co. of Baltimore City v. American Cork Specialty Co.

• Decision Date: 13 January 1914
• Docket Number: 34-36,173,174.
• Citation: 211 F. 650
• Parties: CROWN CORK & SEAL CO. OF BALTIMORE CITY v. AMERICAN CORK SPECIALTY CO. et al. SAME v. BROOKLYN BOTTLE STOPPER CO. et al. SAME v. JOHNSON.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

211 F. 650

CROWN CORK & SEAL CO. OF BALTIMORE CITY v. AMERICAN CORK SPECIALTY CO. et al. SAME v. BROOKLYN BOTTLE STOPPER CO. et al. SAME v. JOHNSON.

Nos. 34-36, 173, 174.

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

January 13, 1914

These causes come here upon appeal to review decrees of the District Court, Eastern District of New York, holding certain claims of three patents to be valid and infringed by defendants. The patents in question are No. 792,284, granted June 13, 1905, to complainant as assignee of William Painter for method of manufacturing bottle closures; No. 887,838 granted May 19, 1908, to complainant as assignee of Painter for a machine for making closures for bottles; and No 887,883, granted May 19, 1908, to complainant as assignee of W. H. Wheeler, for apparatus for the manufacture of bottle closures. These three patents relate to the manufacture of that type of bottle seal which is now widely known under the name 'crown cork.'

At the same time there were argued appeals from orders made in the first two causes, subsequent to interlocutory decrees holding defendants in contempt for disobedience of the injunctions contained in such decrees.

The several opinions of Judge Chatfield, who sat in the District Court, will be found in 190 F. 323, 201 F. 344, and 206 F. 473. In these opinions will be found a very full statement of the facts, with excerpts from the specifications of the patent and a recital of the several claims involved, all of which need not be repeated here.

Livingston Gifford and Robert B. Killgore, both of New York City, for appellants.

James Q. Rice, of New York City, and Robert H. Parkinson, of Chicago, Ill., for appellee.

Before LACOMBE, COXE, and WARD, Circuit Judges.

LACOMBE Circuit Judge (after stating the facts as above).

The peculiar seal for bottles containing gas-impregnated liquids, which has commended itself to the trade and has gone into general use, antedated these patents. The combination of a metal cap with corrugated flange to grip the bottle top, a cork lining or disk, and a fusible binder was covered by earlier patents and had for long been used by complainant. The validity of these earlier patents had been sustained. In producing this structure difficulties were encountered and defects in the product resulted. The patents in suit were devised to overcome these difficulties and to eliminate these defects, which difficulties and defects are fully referred to in the several specifications.

In the first patent (792,284) claim 1 sets forth the process described and patented as follows:

'1. In the manufacture of gas-tight bottle-closures composed in part of metal, the method or process which consists, first, in interposing a suitable fusible protecting and binding medium between the packing or sealing gasket and the coincident surfaces of the metal co-operating therewith; secondly, heating the metal, the gasket, and the binding medium for properly fusing the latter, and in the meantime subjecting the whole to appropriate pressure; and thirdly, cooling the metal and avoiding injury to the gasket from undue heating and hardening the finished medium while maintaining said appropriate pressure, substantially as and for the purpose specified.'

With regard to this claim two contentions are made by defendants:

A. That it must be confined to artificial cooling. The claim does not so state, nor do the specifications require such a limitation to be read into it. The text and the drawings do show air-jets for artificially cooling, but the patentee also states that:

'If the raceway was long enough (and there were no air-jets) the caps and blocks could be moved along (as others entered) and so kept under pressure until sufficient time had elapsed for the prevailing temperature of an average factory to assist in cooling of the cap and disk and hardening the fused medium. It will, however, be obvious that with the variable temperature of a room, as well as of the variations in exterior normal temperature, there would be corresponding variations in time required for perfecting the operation and also that with the long raceway suggested a large number of press-blocks would be required.'

B. That the combined metal cap, cork disk, and binding medium are to be under pressure while the heat is fusing the binder. The claim expressly so states, for it says the second stage of the process consists of heating metal, cork and binder (for the purpose of fusing the latter) and that 'meantime' the whole combination is under pressure. In the specification the patentee states that he deems it...