Macomb, IL

The Macomb, IL PTRC is located within the Government, Legal, Spatial and Data Services Unit of the Western Illinois University Libraries. Dean of Libraries, Michael Lorenzen took over leadership of the WIU Libraries on July 15, 2013. He replaced Phyllis Self who had retired in May, 2013.

This Unit of the Libraries also participates in the Federal Depository Library Program, Illinois Depository Library Program, and Tax Forms Outlet Program. The Unit is also a self-help center for Illinois Legal Aid Online, the law library for the McDonough County Bar Association and local circuit court, and offers GIS and data services.

We are in the 2nd year of being a PTRC. The majority of patent and trademark queries come to us via telephone. One of the ways I often handle such queries is to talk the patron through sections of the USPTO Web pages if the patron is sitting at a computer. Otherwise, I send them an email with important USPTO Web links and PowerPoint tutorials that I have created that contain step-by-step screen shots of patent or trademark searching. Then I encourage the patron to call me with any questions they may have after reading the material I sent them. Some then make a follow-up appointment to come visit me at our library. Others seem to do fine with follow-up emails and phone conversations.

We keep an ongoing display of patents of local inventors at the entrance to our Unit. This display is good advertisement that we are a PTRC. I also put together a poster entitled “Can You Invent a Better Mousetrap” to take with me for speaking engagements and poster sessions that advertises that we are a PTRC. The poster contains images of the progression of patents of some mousetraps up to the common modern day spring mousetrap, of which I show an 1894 patent that was from a local inventor. Mousetraps also make a good generic example for patent searching because people are definitely still trying to invent a better mousetrap. And the last image on the poster is of a cat in a litter box from a cat litter patent. I then explain that the cat is still the best mousetrap of all, and even though one can’t patent a cat, there are many patents out there for cat litter and litter boxes and accessories.