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 #:
000424
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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402 Agreement, Patents & Gaumont Cos. Societe des Etablissements Gaumont, the negative "talking motion pictures" from which such positive "talking motion pictures" are printed or imported not to exceed a total length of twenty-five hundred (2500) running feet of new subjects in any one week during the continuance or this agreement, such number of running feet to be ascertained by adding together the length of one print of eacn new subject so printed or imported without regard to the number of positive prints of each subject which may be printed or imported. The Licensor hereby further licenses the Licensee to exhibit, and to lease for exhibition, in the "territory aforesaid," positive "talking motion pictures" made or imported by it under the foregoing license upon the condition that they be used solely in exhibiting or projecting machines containing the inventions or some of them, of the said Letters Patent, Nos. 578,185; 580,749; 586,953; 588,916; 673,329; 673,992; 707,934; 722,382; 744,251; 770,937; 771,280 ; 785,205 ; and 785,237, and licensed by the Licensor and only when such exhibiting or projecting machines are used in connection with synchronizing "talking motion pictures'* apparatus manufactured or imported by the Licensee and only in connection with the sound records furnished by the Licensee with such "talking motion pictures." The Licensee covenants and agrees not to manufacture or import, during the continuance of this agreement, any motion pictures other than the "talking motion pictures" which the Licensee is hereby licensed to manufacture and import. The parties hereto understand and agree that by the expression "talking motion pictures," as hereinbefore and hereinafter used, is meant a transparent or translucent tape-like film having photographs thereon of an object in motion, used solely in connection with a photographic sound record which has been synchronized with the action represented by the said photographs. The license hereby granted is personal to the Licensee, and not exclusive, and does not include the right to dispose of, in the "territory aforesaid", any cameras embodying any invention covered by said reissued Letters Patent No. 12,037 and Letters Patent Nos. 629,063 and 707,934 and, in the event of tin1 permanent discontinuance or retirement from business of the Licensee for a period of six consecutive months, or upon the termination of the license to George Kleine, referred to in paragraph g hereof, to import motion pictures