[D9241AAS], Letter from Sherburne Blake Eaton to Thomas Alva Edison, April 13th, 1892
https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D9241AAS
Transcription
Letterhead of Eaton & Lewis Law Offices April 13, 1892, Thomas A. Edison, Esq. Dear Sir: Re E.U.P.Co. and Foreign Phonograph Patents. I beg to remind you that the arrangement with the Edison United Phonograph Company is that your assignments of patents, executed by you last week, are to be delivered to that Company, and that they are to give us a written promise to give you a license back for dolls, toys, toy-figures and clocks, when the patents shall have been recorded in the Company’s name. Thus you now part with the entire title and take back a promise that in due time they will assign back to you a license for the above purposes. The form of license was agreed on with your approbation in connection with Case 96, last September. Secretary Morison of the E.U.P.Co. sends me today the letter to you herewith enclosed, and asks me to now give him the assignments of patents which you executed last week. Shall I do so? My reason for submitting this matter to you is that technically speaking, the E.U.P.Co. is possibly not bound by this letter of its Secretary. As regards Case 96, wherein we carried out this same plan last September, Mr. Morison promised that his action should be ratified by the Executive Committee or the Board of Directors. That has not yet been done. He says that there has been no meeting of their Committee or the Board, but that when a meeting takes place, ratification will be made. Shall I deliver the assignments on the strength of the enclosed letter from Secretary Morison, trusting that the Board or Executive Committee will ratify his letter and that the Company will not try to avoid carrying out his promise by resorting to legal technicalities? Very truly yours, [Signed] S.B. Eaton. Letterhead of Edison United Phonograph Company April 12th, 1892, Thomas A. Edison Esq., Orange, N.J. Dear Sir:- We beg to confirm the letter of Seligman & Seligman, to yourself, of the 23rd ult. Enclosing papers to be executed by you for the assignment of Phonograph patents, and promising that this Company, in each case where the reservation for Dolls, Toys, Toy Figures and Clocks was not included would, when the patents should be recorded in the Company’s name, execute, without expense to you, a license in the form already agreed for Case 96. We confirm and repeat that promise, and undertake to execute those licenses, without expense to you, when the patents shall have been recorded in our name. Yours, very truly, [Signed] G.N. Morison (Secretary)