Ramrod bayonet Trapdoor rifle information

[45govt]

From the National Archives website.

"Materials created and produced by United States federal agencies, or by an officer or employee of the United States Government as part of that person's official duties, are considered works of the United States Government. These works are not eligible for copyright protection, in the United States, and are treated as though they are in the public domain."

[Dick Hosmer]

Is the seller such a person?

Did he "create and produce" the item on question, or did he copy the work of others - and by that I do NOT mean the unsung clerks of the 19th century upon whom we all rely?

If he did the work on government time, then the money obtained from any sales should go to the taxpayers. Is that happening here?

I find it VERY interesting to be involved in this discussion, because I, personally, have used material from the SRS books (which I contributed to, as well as buying and paying for my copies) in my book "More .45-70 Springfields, 1873-1893". There were some differences, however. I gave FULL credit to SRS, and I ONLY extracted the serial numbers (which themselves are NOT copyrightable) taking none of the researched data or tabular format.

I STILL think I smell a rat here.

[Carlsr]

Dick, those books are priced well over 100.00. The lowest priced copy I purchased was 175 and the others were much higher. The 1999 edition is listed at 500 to 550 on able books, think that’s were I seen them??? However I was not that desperate and luckily found it much lower elsewhere.
I do also have the thumb drive which I copped to my computer and then downloaded it to my phone so no need to carry those valuable books around.

[Dick Hosmer]

Dick, those books are priced well over 100.00. The lowest priced copy I purchased was 175 and the others were much higher. The 1999 edition is listed at 500 to 550 on able books, think that’s were I seen them??? However I was not that desperate and luckily found it much lower elsewhere.
I do also have the thumb drive which I copped to my computer and then downloaded it to my phone so no need to carry those valuable books around.

Yeah - who knew? If I'd thought they would go up so much, I'd have bought TEN sets!

[Kragrifle]

I own both the original books and the copy sold on EBay. When Frank Mallory ran the operation it had the feel of a collector?s world with additions from subscribers and open discussion. As SRS is now dying it has been run as a money making proposition. The excellent website that I believe was constructed by John Spangler was quickly taken down, all books were taken off the market and you could only get information through the Cabin John address. So, thankfully someone did make copies of the information available, otherwise it will soon be lost unless someone can take over the operation and return it to the collector?s world.

[cessnapilot89]

Thank you all for the help!

[Johnny P]

Someone has posted a copy Charles Clawson's 3rd edition of his Collector's Guide to the internet. It is my understanding that a family lawyer is already lookng into this.