US Plant Patent PP4166
Apple tree
PUBLIC DOMAIN
Patent expired December 20, 1994. This plant is in the public domain — anyone may propagate and sell it.
Twenty years from the filing date would end on November 15, 1996, but this patent ends 696 days earlier — a terminal disclaimer gives term back. A source that calculates twenty years from filing would tell you this plant is still protected when it is already free.
The record
- Patent number
- PP4166
- Filed
- November 15, 1976
- Granted
- December 20, 1977
- Expires
- December 20, 1994
- Assignee
- CALLAHAN CLAUD, MCCORMICK MARJORIE
- Inventor
- HOWELL ZEB KENNETH
No cultivar name of record
This patent does not name the plant, and for its era that is ordinary rather than an omission. Before about 1980, breeders frequently patented a plant without giving it a cultivar name at all — the grant identified it by its number, its parentage and a written description of the flower and foliage. Most plant patents from the 1930s to the 1970s have no name in them.
Nothing here is missing from our records: the patent itself states no name. Where one exists we show it, and we do not invent one.
Abstract
There is disclosed an Apple tree wherein the same comprises a combination of wide angle limb structure, large dark green leaves, golden color apple similar in shape to Starkrimson Red Delicious, smooth russet-free skin, abundant juice when green, early sugar sweet flavor, late harvest ability, long keeping quality in ordinary refrigeration, freeze resistance, firm fruit, high sugar content, exceptional bruise resistance, abundant fruit clusters on long stems and excellent resistance to mildew.
Show the legal claimThe single numbered claim as granted — the legal text that defines what this patent covers.
I claim: 1. A new and distinct variety of Apple tree, substantially as herein shown and described, characterized particularly as to novelty by the unique combination of wide angle limb structure, large dark green leaves, long sleek shape similar to Starkrimson Red Delicious and as compared to Starkspur Golden Delicious, five distinct points similar to Starkrimson Red Delicious, the smooth skin free of russet, the abundant juice even when the fruit is green, with early sugar sweet flavor before Starkspur Golden but still permitting harvest two weeks after Starkspur, and thus extending harvest season, with ability to keep long in ordinary refrigeration, with blossoms larger and darker pink than Starkspur, with very hardy buds and blossoms being freeze resistant; the fruit being firmer and pressure testing at harvest 19 lbs. to 221/2 lbs. and sugar testing 111/2-13% S.S., with extreme resistance to bruising and the abundant fruit clusters with long fruit stems, the variety being very resistant to mildew as compared to other known varieties.
Read the full patent: US Plant Patent PP4166 in full — the complete specification, every figure, and the file history.