US1098154A - Disk-holder. - Google Patents

Description

Patented May 26, 1914.

:iili'illllllilllrl FJB. HOUSH.

DISK HOLDER. APPLICATION FILED I'EB.19, 1914'.

FRANK'IE. HOUSE, OF WINTHBOP, MASSACHUSETTS.

DISK-HOLDER.

Specification of Letters Patent. I P tented. May 26, 1914.

'ikpplioationfiled February 19, 1914. Serial No. 819,620.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, FRANK E. HoUsH, a citizen of the United States, residing at Winthrop, in the county of Sufliolk and State ofMassachusetts, have invented new and useful Improvements in DislnHolders, of which the following is a specification.

This invention relates to improvements in disk-holders; Y -More particularly it relates to improvements in means for conveniently storing, preferably in album, or book. form, disks containing records for mechanical reproduction "of sound. A Efforts have heretofore;

been made in this direction, one of the most successful types being represented by an a1T bum in which each leaf isof stout paper and has a pocket opening at the edge of the leaf, largeenough to receive a single record. It is found .inpractice, however, that hOlClQF S of this type, break at about-the middle of one edge, where the weight is'concentrated,

or where the'stress comes between the disk and the'paper when the leaf is lifted byits edge to turn it over. No means has hitherto been known, so farv as I am aware, to make thepaper endure the stress of repeated turning ofthe leaves, the weight of the disk rec- 0rd being so great, as compared with the weight and strength of the paper which con, fines it. Hence it has not hitherto been possible to produce albums of this sort that will prove satisfactory in service, and it has been necessary to have cabinets of wood, and other relatively elaborate and expensive constructions of board, or of cloth; or to resort to other devices in which the casing holding one disk is not attached to the casingholding another, but each casing isindependent of its neighbors.

It is an object of the invention to overcome the difiiculty mentioned in such manner that record disks may be durably contained in a case having the convenience of handling, indexing, and filing possessed by,

sheets in a book or album, either tight bound or loose leaf and having strength and dura bility that are equivalent to the strength and durability of wood for all practical purposes; together with the lightness of weight, the thinness, and the economy of paper. This object can be attained in a manner "hereinafter set forth which appears to be absolutely satisfactory in the respects mentioned, so far as my experiments have gone, and which ncidentally has other advandescribed.

tages, such as greater safety in protecting fragile disks from breakage by shock. Y

There are several elements which contribute to the making of a perfect filing case of the sort described. One feature is the provision of a circular line of bearing or support, substantially conforming to the curvature of the edge of the disk, whereby the weight of the disk, and the tension exerted on the paper, is'distributed over a long line instead of being concentrated at a. single point of tangency. Another is the meansof making this line of support, viz., by stitches, as compared w th other possible ways suc as gluing or riveting, because the stitches interpose a multiplicity of small positive barriers, viz., those parts of the. stitches which run transversely through the paper,

so'that the stress is resisted by the tensile strength of cord, which is superior to that of paper,.and is received by'the paper in a mulv tiplicity of points, each of which sustains only a greatly sub-divided portion of the entire stress, and, perhaps still more important, the device by which even these points are very largely relieved of shearing stress, so far as the paper is concerned, by the conversion of the stress imposed by the disk on the paper into a bending stress. Another is the shape and closure of the casing by the y formation of a restrictedthroat bearing a certain relation to the diameter of the disk.

Anotherfeature is the friction by which the disk is gripped and-held with cushion effect;

and still another is the means by which the disk is kept seated against the circular barrier, and locked in that position, consisting of a flap at the outer edge of the case,-projecting from the back and capable of being turned over on the face, .so as to prevent the a disk from slipping out, and which is locked by the simple process of closing the album with these flaps folded inward, the stiffness of the paper being. such that the disk cannot slip out nor be removed until the leaves of the album have been separated. These and other features will be apparent from a consideration of the construction hereinafter Variations may be made from the precise construction herein illustrated and described without departing from the scope of the patent as defined in the appended claims, the object of which is to cover such features of patcntahle novelty as exist in the invention disclosed.

One embodiment of the invention is illus-' trated in the accompanying drawings, in which, l

Figure 1 1s a slde vlew of a single casing,

arranged to be used as a leaf in a loose leaf book; Fig. 2 isanedge elevation of a loose 'leaf binder containing a' number of leaves like Fig. 1, one of which is shown in section on its medialline; Fig. 3 is anedge elevation of a detail, enlarged; and 'F igs. 1 and 5 are side views ofmodifica-tions.

Referring to the drawings, the casings for holding the disks are represented as composed of two sheets of strong stifi paper, marked 12 and 13, somewhatlarger than the diameter of the disk 11 which is to be contained. rear one 13,projects materially farther than the other -(to the right, in the drawing) so as to form a flap-14 which is capabl of being folded over upon the face of. the front one 12. Both of them extend to the left in such manner as to have a stub portion adapt ed to be bound, either permanently or loosely in any suitable manner, in a cover or binding. These two sheets are secured together bV a line of stitching, 15,-1.6,17, which, starting near the top of the outer vertical edge of the shorter sheet, proceeds toward the stub for a'distan'ce equal to somewhat less than half the diameter of the disk, and then proceeds farther inward, and downward,

the extreme depthqof the semi-circle near of an album; itlimits the distance which' the stub to the edge where the fold 18 occurs, should be slightly larger than the diameter ofthe disk, to allow for the thickness of the disk when the latter is -inserted between the two sheets, and to allow for the gradual spreading of the sheets to make the cushioning friction grip that the sheets have on the disk. The'line of stitching serves a multi plicity of functions. It fastens together the two sheets, and is the only fastening that need be provided, so that the-twotogether make a case suitable for receiving a record disk, the whole being-comparable to a leaf the disk may penetrate when pushed in; it provides a line bearing for the inner edge of the disk, which extends around the whole inner half of the disk, fittingit in-curvature; it holds the two sheets of stiff paper close together along a definite line close to the edge .of the disk so that when a person takes hold of the outer edge of the disk,

One of them, preferably the.

either directly, or by lifting the leaf, the two sheets act as one to resist any tendency of that disk to bend the paper, and the bending effect is thus located in.a straight line extending across the entire width of the sheet, near the stub, where bending is normal and is harmless; and the holding of two sheets together in this manner provides a frictional grip on the record disk, and a cushion support, both of which I deem of considerable importance. There are also other functions served by' this construction. A double thread style of sewing is preferred, in which the thread is locked at each stitch. I But whatever be the style of sewing itis' evident'that the number of places where the thread goes through the two sheets, make 'a very large number in' total, and constitute a sort of net-work limiting the movement of the disk. Ofcourse they get their lsupport only from the paper,

but as each penetration is separated at a paper, in that they render available for holding the disk firmly all that body ofjthe paper which intervenes betweenplaces where the stitches penetrate the paper. This will be understood from-a consideration of Fig.

3, from which it is clear thatany-pressure of the disk 11 in the'direction of the arrow does not impose stress directly on the thread, but tends to separate the sheets 12 and 13,

and, in so doing is opposed by those. qualities of stifiness and of elasticity which are inherent in the paper. 12, 13, lie parallel to each other, or else slightly divergent on the stub side of the line of stitching; and that portion of the stitch which is marked 10 in Fig. 3ytends to holdthem parallel; but the insertion of the disk 11 separates them, and in so doing bends each sheet, transversely, the bendbeingmore acute the moredeeply' the disk is inserted, but never becoming a sharp bend. This does not tend particularly tor-'ard shearing the paper, because the tough superficial skin of the papef remains unbroken.

The two sheets In practice the resistance becomes great enough to stop a person pushing the disk, before it has got close enough to the stitch to make a bend sharp enough to be in danger of cracking the paper. As the two sheets 12, 13, are rigidly and positively held totion of the disk. The farther the-,-d1sk 'is gether by the successive portions 10 of the pressed inward, the greater this resistance becomes, but in character it IS always a cushioning resistance, because the disk, practically, never gets so far as to reach a positive barrier, and the elasticity of the paper is intervening between the disk and the ultimate barrier afiordcd by the line of stitching. This produces a frictional grip on the record which extends around its periphery. These characteristics are to be distinguished from a case that may be imagined where a disk is put into a circular pocket having a square instead of a V-shaped cross section,

in which case the disk may abut directly against the transverse barrier; and are to be distinguished from the situation where a disk is placed in an Ordinary stiff paper" envelop, in which the limit is formed by a fold in the paper. This makes a U-shaped construction in which the natural tendency of the paper is to open instead of to close;

. and in which it is much easier forthe paper to conform itself to the shape of the edge of the disk, and so for the disk to reach a solid bearing against the fold of the paper. In the first of these cases, there would ordinarily be no friction on the sides; in the second there wouldbe so, little friction, or so easily disappearing with usage, that the lateral pinching effect of the invention would not be attained. The degree of friction with which any particular disk will be thus held depends upon the relation between the thickness and diameter of the disk and the diameter ofthe circular stitching. It is an advantageous characteristic of the invention that the construction illustratcd works satisfactorily upon disks varying both in thickness and in' diameter. In practice, record disks for reproduction of sound are made in standard sizes, as 10- inch, or 12-inch, and the leaves of an album for the envelops would in practice be designed for the particular size; but the disks which are nominally of the same size do in fact vary somewhat from that precise size. If the diameter of stitching be, for example, 10% inches, it will accommodate a disk of ten inches of any of the thicknesses now common on the market, holding it frictionally, and will also accommodate and hold ,frictionally a 10-inch disk which really measures, for example, only 9?;- inches.

I regard it as import-ant that my casing will hold, with gentle frictional cushion-grasp, disks of such different sizes. Another feature of importance is a supplementary means of maintaining the disks within thecasing. Hitherto it has usually beenthought necessary, where disk holders have been assembled in book form, to have the pockets open at the top, sothat the disks would not fall out during handling. This involves the disadvantage that, in order to extract a single disk, it is usually necessary to open the book rather widely in order to relieve that portion of the disk which is next the binding from pressure while being drawnout, and, more important, the action of withdrawing or of inserting the disk tends to wrench or tear the leaf from'its binding. In my invention, the frictional hold upon the disk within may be so strong that the pockets may open at the edge of the casing or leafwhich is. remote from the bind ing, so that the direction of pressure or pull,

toward or from the binding edge. These principles hold true when the underline of stitching is carried straight out from the bottom of theportion 16, asit might be, on

the line 17 as indicated in Figs; but I have devised a further improvement, which is represented .by the location in whichthe stitching 17 in Fig. 1 is shown, inwh-icha narrowed or frictional throat entrance is formed, To do this the circular line of stitching 16 is cbntinued. a little. past. the bottom of the circle and upward to the right, as seen in 1, to .17 wherethe line 17 begins. A similar construction may between the lines 15 and 16. Wliethcrone when putting the diskin or out, is squarely be employed at the top, atthe junction 15,

or both of these variations fromf-the. pos-- sible parallel entrance'borders 15", 1'Z ,.be practised, a throatv is formed whose narrowest part is represented by the distance porary, may be greater than would be desirable for the disk to impose permanently on the paper, as upon the line 16, adjacent to which the disk remains for a long period of time. It may in fact be so great as to prevent thedisk from falling out by gravity, or during ordinary handling and turning of leaves, notwithstanding the leaf be ,held and even shaken or jarred with the mouth of its pocket downward,

The flap 14 is provided by folding one of the sheets, preferably the rear sheet, on a line 18 close to the mouth of the pocket, over upon the face of the other sheet. The mouth of the pocket thus closed isso located that the fold thus made is near to the edge of a disk contained in the pocket, as illustrated. This furnishes an additional means of holding the disk in; and also makes sure that all disks in the album are properly seated in their pockets when the album is closed, be-

flu

cause if any disk be not so, its flap 14'. cannot be closed, thus calling attention to the fact that the disks need adjustment; and it serves the further function of locking the disks in place, because, as illustrated in Fig. 2, when the album is closed, each flap-14 is held down flat by being pinched within the .stack bf leaves. I I

The hole 22 may be cut through the center of both sheets, thus exposing the label on. the

disk within. Near; the stub portion of the leaf, lines or creases 23 may be formed as is customary with loose leaf books, to facilitate.

bending; and in the stub itself, a filler or guard 21 may be employed for the sake of I strength,if the leaves are'to be used as in a i kind of a loose leaf or permanent binding,

the style of loose. leaf binding represented in Fig. 2 is to be understood as merelyindi eating one style of such binding with which the leaves may be used, in which the holes .191

' in the stub of the sheet are penetrated 'b a binding post 19 and held-by thumb nut 19".,

The invention will also be and is'fiii for holding individual record disks apart from albums, affording .a greater protection to the disk by its cushion grasp. and by its line support, as distinguished from the tangentia-l and solid bearing which disks have on the edges of. the square envelops at present so commonly in use. For this the form of stitching shown in Fig. 1 may be used, "or other forms. Simple forms'are illustrated in Figs. 4 and 5. The former rep-resents two square sheets 12, 13, sewn together by stitching on the line 15', 16, 17', the lines 15 and 17 being parallel to each other and the line 16 being a semi-circle connecting them. Fig. 5 shows similarly two square sheets 12', 13', but the line of stitching at the top marked 15 is horizontal over the center'of the pocket, and runs only a short distance, the stitchinglG? is oblique and straight at the lower inner quadrant of'the disk, limiting its depth of insertion and at the same time supporting it; and the line of stitching .17 is oblique, sloping upward and outward, and also forming a support.

Additional fastening'ineans, such as glue,

may be provided if needed, to hold the two sheets securely together; and this may be put anywhere except in the region used for the pocket and entrance thereto. When such a casing as is illustrated in Fig. 5 is used, the

casings filled with disks may be stored on edge, and the edgewhichis the top may bear an index number, filing mark, or blank for notes regarding contents of the casing,

it will naturally put downward the edge 'withthe lines 16'- and 17, thus utilizing the force of gravity inaddition to that of friction for holding the disk in the casing, while permitting the convenience of a file in which each' record stands on edge and is therefore accessible and removable without disturbing others. In this-case it will be noted that although the lines of stitching are straight instead of curved, they embody the function of certain partsof the invention in that they afford a frictional V-grip on those parts of the disk which are next to them, so that when the casing is filed' on edge the Q weight of the disk is suspended from various parts of the sheets 12, 13, and is" not concentrated at the bottom, If the line 16 v e a o 4 were a vertical line, in a casing formed as a leaf of a book, there would be danger of the leaf bending and after a time breaking on.

that line. Consequently when the casings are to be made up as leaves of-a book it is always'desirable that the line of stitching which is toward the bindin be either curved or oblique asgl havefounin'practice"that such constru' ion prevents the bend in the paper fromflfijjiccurring on the line of the stitching. v

- I claim as my invention! v 1. A holder-for a disk comprising the combination of two sheets of relatively stiff, elastic material and means fastening them closer together thanthe thickness of'the disk, there beingan opening for entrance of a .disk between the sheets; said fastening running on a curve for a part of its length, adapted to follow the contour of an inserted disk. w

holder for a disk comprising the combination of two sheets of paper fastened together in close proximity to each other along a curve there being an opening between the sheets for admission of the disk; whereby the insertion of the disk through said opening spreads the sheets'elast-ically in V-shape from said fastening, thereby holding the edge of the disk frictionally.

3. A holder for a disk comprising the combination of two sheets of paper stitched together to form a pocket open at one edge, the'line of stitching passing inward from said open edge, around a curve, and outward, andthe paper sheets being held close enoughtogether by said stitching, so thata disk separates them when inserted and isheld frictionally around a considerable portidn of its edge.

4. A holder for a disk comprising the combination of two sheets of paper stitched together to form a pocket open at one'edge,

the line of stitching passing" inward from J said open edge, around a' curve, and outward, and the paper sheets being held close enough together by. said stitching, so that" a'disk separates them when inserted and is held frictionally around a considerable por-' tion of its edge, the inward and outward 'lines of stitching forming a contracting 6. A protective holder for a disk, comprising a leaf adapted to be bound in an album,

and comprisin two sheets fastened together, forming a poc e t for the disk between them;

. said fastening being on a curved line, conforming to theedge of the disk and holding the sheets closer together than the thickness of a disk, whereby the sheets resist elastically the insertion ofthe'disk and hold it frictionally away from said fastening when inserted, there being a space between said.

curved fastening and the-binding for flexure of the leaf. i

7. The combination of a multiplicity of holders for disks, each holder-comprising two sheets of paper fastened close together along a curved line, there being an opening between the sheets for insertion of a disk;

one of each such pair of sheets having a flap adapted to fold over said opening and lie upon the other'sheet; and means for binding the said multiplicity of holders together in a book, whereby when the book is closed, said flaps are held folded over said openings by the book closure.

. 8.,The combination of.a multiplicity of holders for disks, each holder comprising two sheets of paper fastened close together along a curved line, there being an opening between the sheets for'insertion of a disk;- one of each such pair of sheets having a flap adapted to fold over said opening and lie the sheets for insertion of the upon the other sheet; means for binding said multiplicity of holders together on a straight line oppositesaid opening.

9. The combination of a multiplicity of holders for disks, each holder. comprising two sheets of paper fastened close together along acurved line, there being an opening between the sheets for insertion of a disk; one of each such pair of sheets having a flap adapted to fold over said opening and'lie upon the other sheet; means for binding said multiplicity of holders together on a straight line at a little distance from the curvilinear fastening, the intervening material being flexible. 7

10. A holder for a multiplicity of disks comprising sheets of paper bound together in pairs in the form of a book, each pair of sheets having a line of stitching fastening the sheets together and forming a pocket; said pocket being open for insertion of a diskat the edge remote from, and parallel to, the binding, and said stitching extending from said edge inward toward said binding, and then farther inward, down- K Ward and outward around a semi-circular line, and then outwardto said edge remote sofrom the binding; combined with means for holding disks in the pockets thus formed.

11. The combination of a multiplicity of holders for disks, each holder comprising two sheets of paper fastened close together along lines constituting a pocket adaptedto hold a disk, there being an openin between isk; and means for binding said'holders together; the line of fastening which is toward the binding being not. parallel thereto.

12. A holder for a disk comprising the combination of two sheets of relatively stifl',

elastic material and means fastening them together closer than the thickness of the disk, along lines; there being an opening for entrance of a disk between the sheets; said lines being located so as to form a pocket for the disk, limiting its movement between the sheets elastically.

, Signed by me at Boston, Mass, this tenth day of February, 1914.

FRANK E. HOUSH.

- Witnesses:

JOSEPH T. BRENNAN, EVERETT E. KENT.

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