Volume Eleven - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - some more aspects - Patent Applications by George Taylor, of Penarth, 1883 . . .

The Paris Convention was adopted in the UK in 1883. It was applicable to industrial property which included the protection of rights relating to intellectual property, patents, trademarks, industrial designs, trade names and the repression of unfair competition. This International Agreement was a significant attempt to protect intellectual work and which extended protection to other countries.

The Patent Law Amendment Act, 1852, established a centralised Patent Office and provided a much simplified procedure and cost-basis for registering a patent. It required a description of the invention to be filed and the requirement to publish the application. The Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks Act, 1883, established both the office of the Comptroller General of Patents, and a staff of patent examiners whose duty was to examine patent applications for accuracy in the written description of an application.

In that same year, 1883, George Taylor made three separate applications under the new legislation the progress of which was reported within local newspapers. I came across the following Patents applications of George Taylor during my research into the Penarth Dock story and I assume that Mr Taylor of Penarth relates his experiences to local coal-handling facilities at Penarth Dock. If anybody has further information about his place of residence and profession, etc. it would be most useful to make contact.

Summary of Patents :

Patent No. 2738 dated 1st June 1883 entitled :
'Coal Staith for Loading Ocean-going Steamers'.

Patent No. 4425 dated 15th September 1883 entitled :
'Apparatus for Transferring Coal from Railway Waggons to Vessels'.

Patent No. 4429 dated 15th September 1883 entitled :
'Apparatus for use in Loading Vessels with Coal'.

Patent No. 10,236 - dated 16th July 1884 entitled :
'Staiths or Apparatus for Raising, Lowering, and Tilting Coal Wagons, &c.'.

Patent No. 1395 - dated 16th March 1883 entitled :
'Apparatus for Transferring, Raising, and Tilting Railway Coal Waggons, and Transferring Coal therefrom for Loading Vessels'.