In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants (1913)

Record Details:

Title:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants
Date:
1913
Publisher:
New York, Appeal Printing Co.
Volume:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants : record volume 1
Leaf #:
000178
Language:
English
Collection:
Government & Law and Early Cinema
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
The Museum of Modern Art Library, New York
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
These seven volumes contain the testimonies and supporting documents from the U.S. District Court's antitrust lawsuit against the Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC). Formed in 1908, the MPPC (sometimes referred to asœ"the Edison Trust" or just "the Trust") sought to control the American film industry through pooling patents and demanding that producers and exhibitors acquire licenses to those patents. Independent producers and exhibitors, who refused to license the patents, argued that the MPPC was an unlawful monopoly. In 1912 and 1913, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania heard testimonies from both MPPC members, such as Siegmund Lubin, and "Independents" who later became Hollywood moguls, such as William Fox. Ultimately, in 1915, the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which found the MPPC in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act and spelled the end for the already weakening MPPC. -- Eric Hoyt, 2012
Date Added:
May 23, 2024
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156 Opinion on Camera and Film Patent. into the field of the lens, and later for using a continuously moving sensitized band or strip of paper to receive the successive exposures. The invention of the patent in suit was made by Mr. Edison in the summer of 1889. We shall consider only those references to the prior art which show the nearest approximation to it, and are the most trainable of those which have been introduced for the purpose of negativing the novelty of its claims. The French patent to Du Cos, of 18G4, describes a camera apparatus consisting of a battery of lenses placed together in parallel rows and focused upon a sensitive plate; the lenses being caused to act in rapid succession, by means of a suitable shutter, to depict the successive stages of movement of the object to be photographed. Between the lenses and the plate is arranged a band having a series of openings in such manner that if the band is drawn upwards or downwards the various lenses in the battery will be exposed in succession, so that a large number of small pictures will be taken upon the plate. The patent does not describe the means for moving the plate so as to cause the successive images to be received thereon separately. In a certificate of addition to this patent, he describes an apparatus in which there is a short, endless band, passing over two parallel drums, upon which, as the band is moved by the rotation of the drums, one lens after the other will pass an aperture through which light is rellected from the object to be photographed. Back of the lenses is another band of fabric, passing over drums like the other band, and carrying either a series of sensitized plates or a surface of sensitized paper. This band has projections or pins, which, as the drums are rotated, engage with corresponding projections from the band carrying the lenses. By this apparatus the lenses are made to move in accord with the movement of the band, and as they pass the aperture they project successively upon the sensitized paper, which is moving at the same speed, impressions of the object to be photographed. Practically the images are reproduced from the same point of view — the aperture through which the lenses operate. The expert for the complainant, Prof. Morton, concedes that the Du Cos camera would be capable of taking a series of photographs on a strip of sensitized paper, such as subsequently came into