40 F. 89 | U.S. Circuit Court for the Northern District of Illnois | 1889
Complainant moves for an injunction pendente lite in this case. The bill charges the infringement of patent No. 410,981, granted to Fred. N. Lang, on- the 10th day of September, 1889, for a ‘■Toy Automatic Race-Course,” and contains the usual prayer for an injunction and accounting. The device covered by the patent is a shaft projecting upwards from the center of the base of a circular shell or case, from 15 to 18 inches in diameter, to which shaft a clock-vork mechanism is so geared that it can be made to revolve rapidly by releasing the escapement of the clock-work. On this shaft are mounted two or moro radial arms, to the ends of which are attached small toy figures of horses. These radial arms are attached to the shaft by separate collars so loose that they turn easily on the shaft. The clockwork escapement is released by dropping a nickel coin through a slot in the machine, whereupon the shaft commences to revolve rapidly, carrying the radial arms with it, but, after a certain number of revolutions, the force of the clock-work is cut-off, and the radial arms continue to revolve, from the momentum they have obtained while the clockwork was going, until such arms finally stop from friction and the resistance of the air. Several objections are urged against the motion for an injunction, such as that the bill is multifarious, non-infringement, etc., which I do not deem it necessary to consider, as it seems to me there is sufficient reason on another ground for withholding the injunction. The proof shows that the only use to which complainant’s, or, -for that matter, the defendants’, machines, have been so far applied, is to place them in saloons, bar-rooms, and’other drinking places, where the