In re Wesselman

• Decision Date: 27 April 1942
• Docket Number: Patent Appeal No. 4544.
• Citation: 29 CCPA 988,127 F.2d 311
• Parties: In re WESSELMAN.
• Court: U.S. Court of Customs and Patent Appeals (CCPA)

29 CCPA 988, 127 F.2d 311 (1942)

In re WESSELMAN.

Patent Appeal No. 4544.

Court of Customs and Patent Appeals.

April 27, 1942.

Frank Zugelter, of Cincinnati, Ohio (Donald Gardiner, of Washington, D. C., of counsel), for appellant.

W. W. Cochran, of Washington, D. C. (Clarence W. Moore, of Washington, D. C., of counsel), for Commissioner of Patents.

Before GARRETT, Presiding Judge, and BLAND, HATFIELD, LENROOT. and JACKSON, Associate Judges.

LENROOT, Judge.

This is an appeal from a decision of the Board of Appeals of the United States Patent Office affirming a decision of the Primary Examiner rejecting claims 16 and 17 of appellant's application for a patent. Eight claims were allowed.

Appellant's application relates to a carrier for a plurality of bottles, said carrier being made out of flexible cardboard. In view of the conclusion we have reached in the case it is unnecessary to set out the claims in the opinion.

The references cited are:

Johnson, 1,981,647, November 20, 1934.

Wesselman, 2,171,615, September 5, 1939.

Appellant's alleged invention is described by the Board of Appeals in its decision as follows:

"The invention relates to a bottle carrier made of flexible cardboard. The construction is fully set forth in the above claim. The invention is admitted to be an alleged improvement on the Wesselman patent cited. The improvement consists mainly in providing a median score line between the lines 12 and 12 in this patent. This score line is shown at 10 in Fig. 4 of the present application. The purpose of this score line is to permit folding of the paper along the line. It is also alleged that this fold line performs an additional function of permitting the bottom to sag down so that the bottles will not rest on the bottom but will be supported entirely by the side walls when the carrier is raised."

Appellant's application was filed on December 31, 1936. The cited patent to appellant was granted on September 5, 1939, upon an application filed October 19, 1936; therefore, appellant's instant application was co-pending with his application of October 19, 1936, at the time his patent was issued upon said last-named application.

The involved claims were rejected upon the ground that, in view of the patent to Johnson, they defined nothing patentable over claims 1 and 2 of appellant's patent.

Appellant filed only one reason of appeal, which reads as follows: "1. The Board of Appeals erred in affirming the primary examiner's final rejection of claims 16 and 17 as amended to date."

The Solicitor for the Patent Office raised the question of the sufficiency of this reason of appeal to give this court jurisdiction of the subject matter here involved.

We must hold that, appellant having failed to comply with the provisions of section 4912, R.S., 35 U.S.C.A. § 60, which requires an appellant to file reasons of appeal, specifically set forth in writing, we have no authority to consider the patentability of appellant's claims.

We have repeatedly held that such purported reasons of appeal as appellant has filed are insufficient to confer jurisdiction upon this court to review decisions of the Patent Office tribunals. In re Rosenblatt, 118 F.2d 590, 28 C.C.P.A., Patents, 1036; In re Thomas et al., 83 F.2d 902, 23 C.C.P.A., Patents, 1238; In re Wheeler, 83 F.2d 904, 23 C.C.P.A., Patents, 1241.

In the case of In re Rosenblatt, supra ...