C.O.C.A. Times

geared toward character assassination than patent
rights. The defense attorney, Paul Paul, really
pinned back the ears of Ernest Chester. Chester tes-
~----.--------.,-,--.......,..,..---, tified that they took
no photos of the
Hoot Mon, but they
had already submit-
ted those photos they
took in an earlier
deposition! Chester
was forced to admit
December 1927. A man stopped into St. Paul
that he'd modified
(Minnesota) Recreation pool hall. It was Mr.
the Hoot Mon photo
Elsasser, a private detective working for Chester-
to make the ad for
Pollard. He had a proposition for Mr. Dunn, the pro-
their game. When
prietor. "Sell us this Hoot Mon golf game". A deal
Chester-Pollard real-
was struck. The machine was spirited away to a St.
ly got hurt was
Paul photographer who took the shots shown in this
where attorney Paul,
article and which were later introduced at the trial.
showed that little if
Then the machine was shipped out to New York for
anything in the
study.
Chester-Pollard patents applied to the Hoot Mon
Idea stealing in the coin-op business? Shocking! game. And whatever did apply was invalid due to
The problem was, Popular Games had the same prior art. Prior art is a patent related term that states
kind of lease deal as Chester-Pollard and when they if items from your patent application were used pre-
found the game gone they screamed bloody murder. viously in other patents, your patent is invalid
Dunn hustled off a telegram to Chester-Pollard say- because it copies this prior art (information). So
ing "I need the game back quick!" Chester-Pollard Paul essentially claimed they had no case. The
replied "stall them a little bit, it'll be back soon." judge agreed, and sent down a decision finding no
Chester-Pollard didn't even have a game ready yet, validity to the lawsuit, Chester-Pollard losing the
and the competition already has one on location! case. By the end of the trial Chester-Pollard had
What to do? On December 9th they filed a patent made only about 250 of the small cabinet game, and
infringement lawsuit against Popular Games Inc. still had no large cabinet game. They eventually
The on December 17th they ran another ad warning made one of course, in quantity. Popular Games had
patent infringers against making a golf game and orders for about 250 Hoot Mon games, but the com-
also touting their large cabinet game. Now the pany didn't last long. The lawsuit, general inexperi-
photo of this game's real treat. It has the Hoot Mon ence, and having no new game to sell would doom
cabinet with a Chester-Pollard Football marquee the company. Al Walzer would surface again to
and Football front. Remember the Football only has make more games, but that's another story.
two of the same controls on the front, so they called
it a two player game and showed 2 little golfers
inside! Adobe Photoshop would have been handy!
5¢ Coin Game.
They never made the game, but they had to do
Large cabinet.
something to stop the competition.
Built for
He was a bit of a rookie though, and spilled the
beans about the Chester-Pollard game, stating
"we're coming out with a game. It's nothing like
yours." Chester-Pollard's running scared. This large
game could really hurt them. So they ran a huge ad
in the October 1st Billboard promotion their small
one and five cent games. But in a small note in the
corner of the ad, they mentioned their "exclusive
large cabinet model".Their what? No such thing!
-~~~~~~~~
special locations.
Enclosing two golf
figures, realistic
golf course with its
hazzards, mounds,
lakes and colo,ful
golf course scent.
The trial started in the summer 1928. Chester-
Pollard claimed patent infringement. They had pur-
chased patents in 1927 related to golf games, the
earliest deal completed on July 21st, 1927. This is
almost two months after Popular Games started
making games. Coincidence? Probably not. They
bought two other patents later that year to back up
their claim. They all related to golf games, but were
they infringement? The case for Chester-Pollard
was argued by. Their testimony seemed more
29