Wilson

This is an appeal from an interlocutory judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of California holding claims 1, 4 and 11 of the patent to N. K. Smith No. 1,871,825, issued August 16, 1932, valid and infringed.

The patent in suit is for side door elevators of the type used in the raising and lowering of well casing, tubing, and the like, in the operation of drilling a well and maintaining the same in production. Elevators have long been used in the oil producing industry, and their purpose and manner of use over a long period of time have remained unchanged. These elevators are nothing more than a body and door structure forming a collar which encircles the pipe and has an upper shoulder which is engageable with the shoulder on the coupling or tool joint of the drill pipe or casing which is to be raised or lowered by the elevator. No novelty is claimed for the combination of the body and the door of the collar, nor for the fact that such a combination encircles and raises and lowers the enclosed piping. The sole novelty claimed at the hearing is that the latch which locks the door is swung back and forward on a horizontal pivot, the latch moving in a…