Davis Co. v. Baker-Cammack Hosiery Mills
| Citation | 86 F. Supp. 180 |
| Decision Date | 12 August 1949 |
| Docket Number | 401.,Civ. No. 342 |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Middle District of North Carolina |
| Parties | DAVIS CO. v. BAKER-CAMMACK HOSIERY MILLS, Inc. DAVIS CO. v. BAKER-MEBANE HOSIERY MILLS, Inc. |
James P. Burns, Washington, D. C., Charles A. Noone, Chattanooga, Tenn., Robert E. Burns, New York City, Welch Jordan, Greensboro, N. C., for plaintiff.
Brooks, McLendon, Brim and Holderness, Greensboro, N. C., Paul and Paul, Philadelphia, Pa., for defendant.
The above styled cases were consolidated because the patents in suit are common to both. The plaintiff alleges infringement against the defendant of certain patents owned by the plaintiff, to-wit:
Claim 14 alleged to be infringed by BakerMebane only.
Claims 1 and 4 alleged to be infringed by both defendants.
Claims 10, 12 and 14 alleged to be infringed by both defendants.
Claims 2 and 4 alleged to be infringed by Baker-Mebane, and Claim 4 by Baker-Cammack.
Claims 1 and 7 are alleged to be infringed by both defendants.
Claims 1 to 6 alleged to be infringed by Baker-Cammack; Claims 1 to 7 by Baker-Mebane.
The defenses asserted are:
A. Non-infringement of the claims of all of the patents.
B. Invalidity of all claims in suit:
1. By reason of their lack of definiteness.
2. By reason of the disclosures of prior art patents, both foreign and domestic, catalogues and other publications.
3. By reason of certain prior uses, prior sales, and prior inventions.
4. By reason of double patenting.
C. Laches, acquiescence and estoppel.
D. Implied license from predecessors in title of the plaintiff.
E. Conspiracy between the plaintiff and its predecessors in title which constitutes a violation of the anti-trust statutes of the United States; and
F. Abuse of the patent monopoly.
The cost of the defense is being paid from the funds collected by the Hosiery Investigating Committee contributed by 172 hosiery mills. The plaintiff is a Maryland corporation with offices in Chattanooga, Tenn. The two defendants are North Carolina corporations both located in the Middle District of North Carolina with their principal offices in Burlington, N. C. and Mr. J. E. Baker is President of both corporations.
This litigation concerns patents in the knitting of seamless hosiery which formerly involved three distinct and independent operations. The top of the hose was conventionally produced in the form of rib fabric on a separate machine for that purpose. The leg and foot of the stocking were produced of plain knit fabric formed on a so-called plain knitting machine having a single set of needles known as Cylinder needles. The rib fabric tops produced on the rib machine were transferred by hand to the plain knitting machine. This required the use of a so-called transfer ring on which each succeeding rib top is placed by hand, loop by loop on the pointed quills of the transfer ring. The ring carrying the rib top is then placed on the plain knitting machine with each quill point in the ring fitted over a cylinder needle and the rib top is then moved down by hand from the ring on to the needles so that they will knit the plain knit leg and foot on to the rib top. This was the conventional method at the time of the inventions involved in this suit and the cost per dozen pairs of hose produced by this cumbersome method was 20¢ per dozen pairs more than the cost embodying the inventions of the patents in suit.
Various attempts were made to improve this method of production as well as to devise some ways or means by which hosiery could be produced that would have the appearance of true one by one rib top and be self-supporting and with an anti-ravel edge or selvage. Attempts were made to produce a single machine capable of performing the rib top affecting its automatic transfer and continuing the knitting of the plain knit leg and foot, but this turned out to be very expensive and commercially unsuccessful. Attempts were made to produce a complete stocking on the somewhat simple plain knitting machine having a single set of cylinder needles but none of them were successful or solved the problem until Davis through his invention embodied in patent No. 2,306,246 discovered a commercially successful automatic top stocking possessing self-supporting characteristics that has not only made it competitive with the transferred rib top stocking but which has caused the automatic self-supporting top stocking to substantially displace the transferred rib top stocking in the commercial field. Davis achieved this result through a successful incorporation of an elastic strand into a plain fabric forming the top of the stocking in such manner as to draw in the plain fabric so as to have the normal width of true rib fabric and expansibility equal to or greater than that of true rib fabric and a self-supporting characteristic far beyond that possessed by true rib fabric. To the automatic top stocking of the Davis patent 2,306,246 Getaz invented the anti-ravel, a remarkably successful anti-ravel selvage for the stocking top which obviated the necessity for a separate hemming operation as disclosed in his patent 2,344,350. One method of forming the selvage edge is the subject matter of Getaz patent 2,054,217. Since the public demand required a stocking having the true one-by-one rib appearance Getaz produced an automatic elastic top stocking which was indistinguishable from a true one-by-one rib fabric and is embodied in his patent 2,230,402 and the corresponding method patent 2,230,403.
Full fashioned hosiery is produced on flat bed knitting machines as distinguished from circular knitting machines and it was with the full fashioned hosiery that Gastrich was primarily concerned. He was endeavoring to avoid contraction rather than induce it and in Claims 1 and 4 of his patent No. 2,067,486 he discloses one form of elastic carrying selvage edge but quite different from that contributed by Getaz.
The Baker-Mebane Co. produced Exhibit S-4 on its standard machines, Exhibit S-3 on its Banner 8 step machines and S-2 on Banner 19 step machines. Exhibit S-4 responds to Claim 14 of the Davis patent 2,306,246. It is "an article of hosiery" with "a leg portion comprising a body having a top, said top being plain knit of inelastic fabric and having an elastic thread locked to spaced wales (every other wale) in each of a plurality of spaced courses (every other course), the normal length of elastic thread floated between said spaced wales being less than the normal length of the corresponding portion of the fabric to draw in the inelastic fabric both at and between elastic carrying courses."
S-4 responds to all of the claims of the Getaz anti-ravel selvage edge patent 2,344,350 and disclosed in claims 1 to 7. The stocking S-4 responds to each and every requirement of each of the 7 claims.
The stocking also embodies the features set forth in claims 2 and 4 of the Getaz patent 2,230,402 which calls for "A weft knit stocking having a top and leg of plain fabric, the wales of the leg being a continuation of the wales of the top, elastic yarn under high tension present in a plurality of courses in the top, said elastic yarn being tied in in alternate wales and free of intervening wales, said elastic yarn thereby causing said separated intervening wales to come together, bury the alternate wales and form a flat front on the fabric similar to a one by one rib fabric."
The method as defined in Claim 1 and 7 of the Getaz patent 2,230,403 was performed in the production of the stocking S-4 and this is also true of the method Claims 10, 12 and 14 of Getaz patent 2,054,217. S-4 also infringes Claim 1 and 4 of the Gastrich patent 2,067,486. Exhibit S-3 produced on the Banner 8 step machine infringes the four Getaz patents in suit as to all claims in suit with exception of Claim 2 of Getaz patent 2,230,402 and Claim 7 of patent 2,344,350.
The anti-ravel selvage edge of the stocking S-3 is precisely the same in structure and produced in precisely the same manner as the anti-ravel selvage edge of the stocking S-4 and hence infringes all of the claims of the patents in the same manner as heretofore recited in respect of S-4.
The stocking S-2 is undoubtedly the same as stocking S-3 and constitutes an infringement of the claims in suit for the same reasons assigned as to stocking S-3.
The Baker-Cammack Hosiery Mills manufactured plaintiff's Exhibit S-1 which differs from S-2 and S-3 in two particulars. (a) the selvage edge of the stocking S-1 is comprised of multiple strands of elastic thread as distinguished from a single strand of elastic thread selvage edge of each of the stockings S-2 and S-3. And (b) S-1 embraces several courses of ornamental tuck stitches immediately below the anti-ravel selvage edge and infringes Claim 4 of Getaz patent 2,230,402 and the method Claims 10, 12 and 14 of Getaz patent 2,054,217 and Claims 1 and 7 of patent 2,230,403.
It is well to bear in mind that the consuming public seems to have been wedded to the idea of a rib topped hose. All of those experimenting with the solution of the problem were striving for a solution resulting in a rib top or a simulated rib top hose. Many fruitless efforts had been put forth to secure a hose with a self-supporting top and these experiments had been taking place for many years prior to the Davis invention. In 1930 the U. S. Rubber Co. brought on the market a covered rubber yarn known by the trade name "Lastex". It was employed with some measure of success when knitted as a yarn and constituting the body fabric in such things as girdles, surgical stockings and the like. Davis endeavored to use it but failed because it had an insufficient elasticity which prevented it from being pulled over the heel of the wearer. In 1934 Davis devoted his attention to the production of an automatic...
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Baker-Cammack Hosiery Mills v. Davis Co., 5995.
...in one trial in the District Court, and conclusions of law and an opinion applicable to both cases were filed by the District Judge. 86 F. Supp. 180, 181. The court held in separate decrees that the patents are valid and have been infringed as alleged. The court also decreed in each case th......
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Redman v. Stedman Manufacturing Company
...provisions have either been unchallenged or approved by the Court of Appeals for this circuit. In Davis Company v. Baker-Cammack Hosiery Mills, D.C.M.D.N.C.1949, 86 F. Supp. 180, it was held that 172 hosiery mills comprising the membership of the Hosiery Investigating Committee, which joint......
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Ransburg Electro-Coating Corp. v. Proctor Electric Co.
...the '893 and '894 patents.31 The '893 and '894 claims in suit are entitled to the parents' filing dates. Davis Co. v. Baker-Cammack Hosiery Mills, D.C.M.D.N.C.1949, 86 F.Supp. 180, 186, aff'd., 4 Cir. 1950, 181 F.2d 550, 558. Double Patenting. Defendants contend that the Starkey '417 appara......
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Keiser v. High Point Hardware Company, C-95-G-58.
...Redman v. Stedman Manufacturing Company, 181 F.Supp. 5 (M.D.N.C.1960) (where the cases are reviewed at length); Davis Company v. Baker-Cammack Hosiery Mills, 86 F. Supp. 180, affirmed 4 Cir., 181 F.2d 550 (1950); Aghnides v. S. H. Kress & Co., 140 F.Supp. 582, affirmed 4 Cir., 246 F.2d 718 ......