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The Patent Office fire of 1877 was the second of two major fires of the
U.S. Patent Office
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is an agency in the U.S. Department of Commerce that serves as the national patent office and trademark registration authority for the United States. The USPTO's headquarters are in Alexa ...
. It occurred in the
1864 Patent Office Building of Washington, D.C., on September 24, 1877. The building was constructed to be
fireproof
Fireproofing is rendering something (structures, materials, etc.) resistant to fire, or incombustible; or material for use in making anything fire-proof. It is a passive fire protection measure. "Fireproof" or "fireproofing" can be used as a n ...
, but many of its contents were not. About 80,000 models and 600,000 copy drawings were burned to some degree. No patents were completely lost, however (unlike the situation with
the first Patent Office fire), and the Patent Office was soon reopened for recordings.
History
On July 4, 1836, the Patent Office became its own organization within the
Department of State under the
Patent Act of 1836.
Henry Leavitt Ellsworth
Henry Leavitt Ellsworth (November 10, 1791 – December 27, 1858) was a Yale-educated attorney who became the first Commissioner of the U.S. Patent Office, where he encouraged innovation by inventors Samuel F.B. Morse and Samuel Colt. Ells ...
became its first commissioner. He started construction of a new
fire-proof building, after the previous building had burned down in a disastrous fire. Architect
Robert Mills was given instructions by
Congress
A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...
to design the building using fireproof construction material. Mills used masonry vaulted ceilings that spanned the interior spaces for an
open floor plan, cement plastered walls, and
cantilevered
A cantilever is a rigid structural element that extends horizontally and is supported at only one end. Typically it extends from a flat vertical surface such as a wall, to which it must be firmly attached. Like other structural elements, a cant ...
stone staircases from floor level to floor level. Construction of the building was finished in 1864.
The
Patent Office fire started at about 11 am on September 24, 1877. It was reported in the newspaper that the fire started in the room that held the
patent models.
There was a considerable amount of flammable material in that area. Spontaneous combustion of patented chemicals has been given as one of the theories for the start of the fire.
Another theory was that a lens might have caught the sun's rays and focused them on a combustible object. Others claim that it was an unseasonably cold morning, and that a fire started by some copyists in their office grate emitted sparks that fell onto the roof and caught a wooden
gutter screen on fire. The roof was constructed of wood, which led to a rapid ignition and a fast-moving disastrous building fire.
[ The fire burned part of the upper portions of the north wing and the west wing, consuming half the building.]
The '' Evening Star'' reported that the spectacle of the building going up in flames became extraordinarily shocking to the spectators as it turned into a calamity. Despite the fire-proof construction efforts the fire consumed the building and devoured some 87,000 patent models with their associated documents. Some of the important artifacts were saved, however, due to the extraordinary efforts of the Patent Office staff and some valiant firemen.
Models destroyed
This second Patent Office fire was even more destructive than the first fire in 1836 at Blodget's Hotel. According to the person in charge of the models, about 87,000 models were burned to one degree or another and some 600,000 photo-lithographic drawings were damaged by fire and or ruined by water. Although the building may have been considered fire-proof, the contents were not. An early part of the conflagration
A conflagration is a large fire. Conflagrations often damage human life, animal life, health, and/or property. A conflagration can begin accidentally, be naturally caused (wildfire), or intentionally created (arson). A very large fire can produc ...
was a storage room used for rejected and postponed models. There were 37,000 postponed application models and 12,000 rejected cases, making the total damage tally around 136,000 patent models (of one type or another). The monumental building cost almost $3,000,000 in nineteenth-century dollars.[ ''Previous to the occurrence of the fire the Patent Office Building had been looked upon as a fireproof structure.''] A source reported the loss due to the fire as over a half a million dollars in value.
The Patent Office could loan out the rejected models to museums and other organizations; however, due to future potential patent infringement they were against such transfers to preserve the integrity of the inventor's idea. These models included metal-working
Metalworking is the process of shaping and reshaping metals to create useful objects, parts, assemblies, and large scale structures. As a term it covers a wide and diverse range of processes, skills, and tools for producing objects on every scale ...
machines, wood-working machines, agricultural implements, carriages, wagons
A wagon or waggon is a heavy four-wheeled vehicle pulled by draught animals or on occasion by humans, used for transporting goods, commodities, agricultural materials, supplies and sometimes people.
Wagons are immediately distinguished from ...
, railroading
Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a prep ...
, mechanical
Mechanical may refer to:
Machine
* Machine (mechanical), a system of mechanisms that shape the actuator input to achieve a specific application of output forces and movement
* Mechanical calculator, a device used to perform the basic operations of ...
, hydraulic
Hydraulics (from Greek: Υδραυλική) is a technology and applied science using engineering, chemistry, and other sciences involving the mechanical properties and use of liquids. At a very basic level, hydraulics is the liquid counte ...
and pneumatic engineering. An example of the original Eli Whitney cotton gin was among the representative models destroyed. In the south and west wings of the Patent Office there were some 100,000 models that were not damaged. Reports of the time show about two-fifths of all the models were damaged either by fire or water. An estimated 200,000 drawings were hastily carried out of the building before they were damaged.
In spite of these great monetary losses (many times those of the first Patent Office fire of 1836), there were no patents totally destroyed in the fire. There were duplicates of the drawings (a lesson learned from the first Patent Office fire in 1836) and it was just a matter of printing them again. Despite the loss of the upper floors and some accumulated trash, the Patent Office was soon reopened.
See also
* 1836 U.S. Patent Office fire
* 1973 National Archives fire
References
Sources
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External links
Rothschild's Petersen Patent Model Museum timeline
{{DEFAULTSORT:United States Patent And Trademark Office
1877 in Washington, D.C.
1877 fires in the United States
Building fires in the United States
Fires in Washington, D.C.
Robert Mills buildings
Legal history of the United States
History of patent law
1877 in American law
Lost historical records