Werckmeister v. American Lithographic Co.

• Decision Date: 05 December 1903
• Citation: 126 F. 244
• Parties: WERCKMEISTER v. AMERICAN LITHOGRAPHIC CO. et al.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

126 F. 244

WERCKMEISTER v. AMERICAN LITHOGRAPHIC CO. et al.

United States Circuit Court, S.D. New York.

December 5, 1903

Antonio Knauth, for plaintiff.

William A. Jenner, for defendants.

WHEELER District Judge.

The bill alleges that the 'orator for several years prior to the year 1894, and ever since said year, has done business under the name of Photographische Gesellschaft at Berlin, Germany'; that shortly previous to the 2nd of April, 1894, one W. Dendy Sadler, a British subject invented, designed and painted a certain painting called 'Chorus'; that said painting shows a group of gentlemen sitting and standing around a punch bowl, and holding pipes and filled glasses in their hands and singing in chorus'; that Sadler about April 2, 1894, assigned to the orator 'the sole liberty and right of printing reprinting, publishing, completing, copying, executing, finishing, and vending said painting'; that the 'orator before the publication thereof in this or any foreign country, to wit, on the 16th day of April, 1894, delivered to the Librarian of Congress, at his office at Washington, District of Columbia, a description of said painting, to wit, 'Chorus,' W. Dendy Sadler, 'a company of gentlemen with filled glasses singing in chorus,' and also a photograph thereof '; that about the 1st day of June, 1894, and not before, your orator began the publication of said painting in this country and in foreign countries '; and that the orator has printed and continues to print therefrom copies of said painting, and has duly given notice of your orator's copyright, as is required by law, by inscribing upon a visible portion of every copy of said painting published by your orator the word 'Copyright,' together with the year the copyright was entered, and the name of the party by whom it was taken out, thus: 'Copyright, 1894, by Photographische Gesellschaft.''

The defendants, pleading 'to the whole of said bill, say upon information and belief, that the said painting 'Chorus,' alleged in the bill of complaint to have been copyrighted by complainant herein on the 16th day of April, 1894, was publicly exhibited by the author and proprietor thereof at the exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts, held in the city of London, England, from the first Monday of May, in the year 1894, to the first Monday of August, in the same year, both days inclusive, and continuously during that period, and was during the whole of said period exhibited to the public and published, and that there was not at any time during the said exhibition, nor before, nor at any time since, any notice of the said copyright inscribed upon some visible portion of the said painting, or on the substance on which the same was mounted, as required by the statute in such case made and provided, and that such...