George W. Blair: the works' most prolific patentee

1925–1950 · DESIGNS, FASTENERS, FLOOR COVERINGS, SPONGE RUBBER

The count: No name stands on the Mishawaka works' paper more often than George W. Blair's. The lists and the verified records give him, alone or with partners, forty-nine grants between 1925 and 1954 — footwear designs, the slide-fastener campaign, the floor-covering patents and their court fight, the seat-cushion line, and the sponge-rubber grants that close the subsidiary's own practice — and his arc is the works' arc in miniature: what Blair patented, decade by decade, is what the plant was making.

The designer, 1925–1930: Blair enters the lists in the design columns: Design No. 67,571, "Overshoe," of 16 June 1925, and Design No. 67,739, "Shoe," of 7 July 1925, both assigned to the Mishawaka Rubber and Woolen Manufacturing Company; Design No. 73,597, "Shoe," 1927; Design No. 74,252, "Shoe sole," of 17 January 1928; Design No. 78,502, "Shoe sole," 1929; and with Conrad Ferrettie, Design No. 81,438, "Combined shoe sole and heel," 1930. Utility grants run beside the designs from 1927: No. 1,648,932, "Shoe," of 15 November 1927, and No. 1,650,817, "Shoe-sole construction," of 29 November 1927; No. 1,684,060, "Shoe," of 18 September 1928. The Index entries of these years do not print Blair's residence; his patent faces of 1936 and 1943 print him of Mishawaka, and the assignment line in every entry is the company's own — Class 1, with the residence carried from the faces.

The floor coverings and the court fight: With John F. Schott, Blair took No. 2,032,832, "Floor covering and the like," application filed 1 November 1933, patented 3 March 1936 — the face was read, and it prints both men "of Mishawaka, Ind., assignors to Mishawaka Rubber and Woolen Manufacturing Company, Mishawaka, Ind., a corporation of Indiana." The patent's court life is a matter of federal record and is printed at the strength the record earns: in the interference with Vrooman, assignor to the Paine & Williams Company, the Patent Office awarded Blair and Schott priority on the nine article claims; the district court then found no patentable novelty in those article claims, holding them anticipated by Neefus No. 112,168 of 1871, Koehler No. 1,536,223 of 1925, and Punke No. 1,820,324 of 1931, and the method count went to Vrooman; the Sixth Circuit's opinion stands at 139 F.2d 603 (1943). The company filed a disclaimer to the patent in March 1944, a notice the 1944 Index itself carries. The line continued on paper meanwhile: No. 2,230,128, "Making contoured floor coverings," of 28 January 1941, Blair and Schott again; and No. 2,338,022, "Apparatus for making automobile floor coverings and the like," of 28 December 1943.

The cushion and sponge years: With Schott and Wendell E. Faulk, No. 2,251,318, "Cushioning facility for seats and the like," of 5 August 1941. Alone, No. 2,315,391, "Cushion," of 30 March 1943. With Schott, No. 2,310,830, "Molding apparatus for open type cushions," of 9 February 1943. With Virgil H. Bodle, No. 2,325,903, "Method of making sponge rubber material," of 3 August 1943, and No. 2,480,316, "Method of making laminated cushion material," of 30 August 1949 — the second of these printing Bodle by then of Los Angeles, California, the partnership carried across the continent and still assigning to the Mishawaka house. With Faulk — by 1946 printed of Grosse Pointe, Michigan — and Schott, No. 2,411,412, "Seat structure," of 19 November 1946. And in the parent channel, which the later entries open in full: Blair alone to the United States Rubber Company, No. 2,378,126, "Container," of 12 June 1945, and No. 2,446,075, "Preparation of rubber crumbs," of 27 July 1948; with Schott and Eugene A. Luxenberger, No. 2,376,281, "Method and apparatus for producing latex foam," of 15 May 1945; and with William J. Clayton, Edward H. Clark, Schott, and A. W. Keen of Packanack Lake, New Jersey, No. 2,441,235, "Apparatus for making sponge rubber articles," of 11 May 1948. The last Blair grant the sweep found assigns, fittingly, to the Mishawaka company itself: with Bodle, by then of Alhambra, California, and Lucian P. Dosmann, No. 2,501,839, "Sprayed rubber surfacing," of 28 March 1950 — a quarter-century after the overshoe designs, the works' most prolific patentee closes his Mishawaka paper in the Mishawaka name.

Sources:

1. Index of Patents Issued, 1925, 1927–1931, 1936, 1941–1943, 1945, 1946, 1948–1950 — the Blair grants as itemized, design and utility lists both read.
2. U.S. Patent No. 2,032,832, specification page read from the Patent Office's own image file — the residence and assignment lines, application of 1 November 1933, Serial No. 696,136.
3. Blair v. Paine & Williams Co., 139 F.2d 603 (6th Cir. 1943), as reported — the interference priority award, the anticipation holdings against Neefus, Koehler, and Punke, and the method count to Vrooman; the March 1944 disclaimer notice as the 1944 Index prints it.
4. PubChem patent records for U.S. 2,325,903, 2,480,316, 2,251,318, and 2,310,830 — inventor full names, including Wendell E. Faulk.