h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm in posession of a newspaper clipping that is a copy of a letter my father wrote while in London as a Canadian soldier during World War II.

Now, my father was the original author. He died in 1973. I'm his only child. So far, so good.

The person to whom the letter was addressed got that letter printed in a local Canadian newspaper. I don't know which newspaper and I don't know the date of publication, other than sometime in the early 1940's.

So, if I post that letter, written by my father, am I violating copyright law because it was published in a newspaper first?

Thanks for your help on this one.

My 2 cents would be that this would *not* be a copyright violation, but I wouldn't consider my opinion on this to be definitive by any means. Here's my reasoning:

Your father wrote the letter, therefore he obviously held the original copyright.

He sent the letter to a friend. Whether the friend had the OK to send the letter off to the newspaper is another issue altogether, but once the letter was in his possession, he could likely do what he wanted with it. However, this friend could not have had a exclusive copyright to the letter -- he was not the author, and it's extremely unlikely that your father signed anything giving the friend exclusive copyright.

If the friend was not in possession of exclusive copyright, he would not have had the legal ability to pass on exclusive copyright to the newspaper when he sent it in to be published. Regardless, none of the newspapers I know of obtain an exclusive copyright on letters to the editor and such.

Hence, your father still had legal rights to the letter at that point -- if he was alive and had an h2g2 account, he could post it without violating anything.

As his only child, you would have inheirited the copyright if both he and any wife he might have had at the time of death have died (in most American states (if not all), assets pass to a surviving spouse before to children). Hence, you would have the right to post it wherever you please.

Just my 2 cents.
Mikey

I thought it had been worked out that the sender holds no copyright on mail, either postal or electronic?
And if there is copyright, I think it expires after 50 years anyway, so you're probably safe.

I think I'm PROBABLY safe, too. I'd like to KNOW I am before I do the transcription. Copyright law can get kind of complex. I know that I'm a legitimate copyright holder for the contects of that letter. I don't know if I'm the ONLY legitimate copyright holder.

The letter contains "significant creative content," but that wasn't part of the copyright law when the letter was written.

I don't have a hint how long copyrights lasted in the 1940s.

I probably could do the research myself and get all the information, but basically, I'm lazy. Someone here will have a definite answer for me.

Mina, I think that the discussions on other threads about email copyright were referring mostly to business correspondence, and to the information in the email as compared to the actual text - it's only the content of a business letter that normally matters, whereas in something personal like a love letter the exact text is also important.

As far as I remember, there have been various copyright problems for biographers of famous writers when it comes to letters. In a hypothetical example, if James Joyce had written letters to Samuel Beckett, the Beckett estate would own the letters but the Joyce estate would own the copyright. (I thought of them because both estates are notoriously sticky about copyright.) The Beckett estate could stop people looking at the letters and the Joyce estate could stop people quoting them directly. But as far as I know, a biographer without permission to quote directly could still refer to the information in the letters in a general way.

As far as the time limit is concerned, it is now 70 years after the author's death before a work goes out of copyright. I don't think anyone posting to h2g2 is likely to have a parent who died more than 70 years ago!

azara

That wasn't quite my question, Azara.

Since, effectively, I'm the estate, I'm feeling pretty clear on that part of the question.

what I'm NOT sure about is if the newspaper that published the letter has any claim to the copyright.

Hi, NBY!
You said 'That wasn't quite my question, Azara.'

Well, yes, I know that, but since my previous post was in answer to Mina's post, and started out 'Mina.....', I expected people to realise that I was commenting on the points in Mina's post rather than on your original post.

I don't think you actually gave enough information in your first post to make the issue clear-cut enough. Does the original letter still exist anywhere? Is the original recipient dead as well as your father?

If the only version that exists is that in the newspaper, what details does it give of the author? I can think of four possiblities:
1 The author was identified in the paper only as a Canadian soldier.
2 The letter was reprinted with only an informal signature such as 'your friend Mike'.
3 The letter was reprinted with a more formal signature 'Mike Yet'.
4 The letter was reprinted with a specifically identifying signature 'Mike Yet, Captain, Unit X, Regiment Y.'
(The same possibilities apply to identifying the recipient).

I doubt if you have any way at all of proving copyright in the first two cases - your memory of what your father said thirty years ago about something that happened thirty years before that is fairly tenuous hearsay, and would hardly be legal proof that he was the author. In the fourth case it sounds like you would have a fairly sure claim, while the third case would depend on how common your father's name was and whether there were any other serving Canadians with the same name.

If the original no longer exists, however, I don't think you have any proof that the printed letter is exactly as your father wrote it. If the paper typically rewrote or edited contributions heavily, I think the paper might have some copyright claim, in the absence of any proof that it was your father's sole work.

Azara

Right you are, Azara...


Oops. You mean, the world DOESN'T revolve around me and there's a possibility that someone could be addressing someone other than me somtimes?


*Does the original letter still exist anywhere?

Nope.

*Is the original recipient dead as well as your father?

Yep.

*3 The letter was reprinted with a more formal signature 'Mike Yet'.

Yep.

*The same possibilities apply to identifying the recipient

I'll take door number 2 on this one. It opens with, "Well, you Perrys,... being a letter to Mr. and Mrs. Perry.

*while the third case would depend on how common your father's name was and whether there were any other serving Canadians with the same name.

Common surname - Almost certainly other Canadians with the same name.

*If the original no longer exists, however, I don't think you have any proof that the printed letter is exactly as your father wrote it. If the paper typically rewrote or edited contributions heavily, I think the paper might have some copyright claim, in the absence of any proof that it was your father's sole work.

And that's the problem. I don't know WHAT newspaper it was, so I don't know what it's editorial policies were on these letters.

It reads like my father wrote.

, NBY!

This sounds like one of those frustrating situations where common sense and natural justice are all on your side, but your strict legal position is slightly dodgy.

Stiil, if you want to include it in an entry, I think I'd be inclined to go ahead, with a footnote to the effect that 'This version is the text published by the addressee in an untraced Canadian local newspaper in the 1940s, and may include some small editorial changes.'

Azara

Hi folks,

What you all say is largely correct. If the source newspaper is untraceable, and you have made 'reasonable attempts' to contact the original authors and publishers, you may include the letter here, as long as there have been no subsequent reprints, for which permission must also be acquired.

If we then receive complaints from any of the parties involved, we will look into the matter further, based upon the nature of the complaint, and may have to remove the material, although this seems very unlikely in this instance.

Thank you.

I thought something like that might be the case.

I'll transcribe the letter and submit it to peer review this weekend.

1940 London through the eyes of a Canadian Soldier.