Clarification of Answer by
grimace-ga
on
06 Apr 2003 05:40 PDT
Ho hum - the US law on this seems to be more of a tangled web than I
had thought; unlike many other countries, the US did not apply their
copyright legislation retrospectively; thus, works published before
the 1978 Copyright Act are treated entirely differently.
Works Originally Created and Published or Registered before January 1,
1978
Under the law in effect before 1978, copyright was secured either on
the date a work was published with a copyright notice or on the date
of registration if the work was registered in unpublished form. In
either case, the copyright endured for a first term of 28 years from
the date it was secured. During the last (28th) year of the first
term, the copyright was eligible for renewal. The Copyright Act of
1976 extended the renewal term from 28 to 47 years for copyrights that
were subsisting on January 1, 1978, or for pre-1978 copyrights
restored under the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), making these
works eligible for a total term of protection of 75 years. Public Law
105-298, enacted on October 27, 1998, further extended the renewal
term of copyrights still subsisting on that date by an additional 20
years, providing for a renewal term of 67 years and a total term of
protection of 95 years.
From the US copyright office
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html#hlc
Works Published and Copyrighted before January 1, 1978
A work published before January 1, 1978, and copyrighted within the
past 75 years may still be protected by copyright in the United States
if a valid renewal registration was made during the 28th year of the
first term of the copyright. If renewed by registration or under the
Copyright Renewal Act of 1992 and if still valid under the other
provisions of the law, the copyright will expire 95 years from the end
of the year in which it was first secured.
Therefore, the U. S. copyright in any work published or copyrighted
prior to January 1, 1923, has expired by operation of law, and the
work has permanently fallen into the public domain in the United
States. For example, on January 1, 1997, copyrights in works first
published or copyrighted before January 1, 1922, have expired; on
January 1, 1998, copyrights in works first published or copyrighted
before January 1, 1923, have expired. Unless the copyright law is
changed again, no works under protection on January 1, 1999 will fall
into the public domain in the United States until January 1, 2019.
US Copyright Office
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ22.html#before
This makes things simpler for us, as we are indeed just going by
publication date. Thus the following illustrations are in the public
domain:
Mabel Lucie Atwell (pub. 1910)
Arthur Rackham (1907)
Bessie Gutmann (1907)
AE JAckson (1915)
Whereas Gwynedd Hudson (1925) is not.
Hudson's illustrations *are* public domain, however, if no renewal was
made after 28 years. Unfortunately, the copyright office's searchable
database only covers works registered since 1978 (and, indeed, is not
currently working). The only way, as far as I can tell, of discovering
if the renewals were made is to do a manual search at the Copyright
Office for the princely sum of $75 an hour. This, you will agree,
seems rather exorbitant. If the renewal *was* made, Hudson's
illustrations will not come into the public domain for another fifteen
years.
Hope this clarifies things - I'd love to see the site when you put it
together.
grimace
