Editing Patent model (section)

== History ==

In the US, patent models were required from 1790 to 1880.<ref name="NYT">Riordan, Teresa. [https://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/18/business/18PATE.html?pagewanted=all Patent Models' Strange Odyssey], [[New York Times]], February 18, 2002.</ref> The [[United States Congress]] abolished the legal requirement for them in 1870, but the [[United States Patent and Trademark Office|U.S. Patent Office]] (USPTO) kept the requirement until 1880.<ref name="SF">[http://keelynet.com/patentfix.htm A Simple Fix for the US Patent System: The Legal Requirement For Working Models], KeelyNet website. Retrieved September 12, 2010. {{webarchive|url=http://web.archive.org/web/20190122120202/http://keelynet.com/patentfix.htm}}</ref>

On July 31, 1790, inventor [[Samuel Hopkins (inventor)|Samuel Hopkins]] of [[Pittsford, Vermont]] became the first person to be issued a patent in the United States. His patented invention was an improvement in the "making of [[potash|Pot Ash]] by a new apparatus & process." These earliest patent law required that a working model of each invention be produced in miniature.

Some inventors still willingly submitted models at the turn of the twentieth century. In some cases, an inventor may still want to present a "working model" as evidence of [[reduction to practice|actual reduction to practice]] in an [[interference proceeding]]. In some jurisdictions patent models stayed an aid to demonstrate the operation of the invention.  In applications involving [[genetics]], samples of genetic material or DNA sequences may be required.