Page:United States Reports, Volume 257.djvu/110

Rh 27. then the cooling on a slab, and then the pulling. After boiling and cooling, it is a compact mass of dark color. The pulling aerates it and makes it less in weight but larger in bulk, lighter in color and more capable of holding flavor. Until the beginning of this century, candy was pulled only by hand. It required much strength. Candy pullers were hard to get. The work was strenuous and produced perspiration and uncleanliness. It was done with the bare hands, and it was impossible to avoid danger from eczema and abrasions of the skin of the hands. It was neither appetizing nor sanitary. A good candy puller might pull three hundred pounds of candy a day. The capacity of the large machines now in use is two and one-half tons each, and one man can attend to two machines. Thus since 1900, the art has advanced from a production of 300 pounds a day to 10,000 pounds, with the same labor.

In April, 1900, Dickinson published an article in the trade journal, "The Confectioner," describing a machine for pulling candy and offering it for sale. He advertised it quite largely. Hildreth ordered the Dickinson machine, tested it and rejected it as unsatisfactory. One of Hildreth's men, Thibodeau, having seen and worked on the Dickinson machine, made a machine which worked better. Hildreth filed an application for a patent for one device for pulling candy September 21, 1900. Thibodeau filed an application for another November 26, 1900, and an interference was declared between them. Thibodeau thereafter bought Dickinson's invention and caused him to file an application for a patent November 5, 1901. Six applications were pending in the Patent Office at the same time, those of Dickinson, Hildreth, Jenner, Thibodeau, Robinson and Henry, and the Patent Office framed the issue between them in terms exactly those afterwards granted to Dickinson as the claim relied on in this case.