Useful Arts: The Patent Record as a Tool for Historical Inquiry

Patent protection in the United States was codified by Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution, often referred to as the Patent Clause. Since the beginning of patent protection in the U.S., millions of patents have issued covering three main avenues: the functional (utility) elements of an invention, ornamental (design) aspects, and plant patents covering new varieties of living plants. The scope and detail of the U.S. patent record offers historians and researchers an unprecedented level of detail identifying originating ideas related to a spectrum of historically significant technologies and innovative concepts. By mapping the contours of innovation using a novel approach to historical analysis, the patent record can serve as a powerful exploratory tool.

Here, three different exemplary channels are explored:

• The first researches the genesis of geospatial technology in the patent record. In this analysis, a complex topic is broken into constituent elements and traced back to inventive origin points. By doing so, we are able to add a new interpretation to the predominantly military-driven origins underlying this technology and instead utilize the patent record to emphasize earlier commercial interests directed towards resource extraction and other civilian applications.

• The second explores a more temporally concentrated space relating to advances in nuclear technology resulting from the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Here, a targeted investigation into a specific technology maps the impact of policy on forcing technological innovation in the field of nuclear engineering.

• The third relates to design and ornamental protections related to American jubilee and celebration. In this investigation, an uptick in patriotic design patent protections are notable in the lead up to the American centennial (1876), sesquicentennial (1926), and the bicentennial (1976), as well as other notable temporal markers in American history.

The poster aims to use infographics to explore the proliferation of historical topics through the patent record. The poster will show numbers of patents issued within delineated technology areas and relative increases in relevant patent issuance to underpin contentions about the value of the patent record as a research tool in historical contexts. The anatomy of the U.S. patent classification system and examples of patent research interfaces with also be integrated into the poster