US1405131A - Mailing blank or sheet - Google Patents

Description

A. w. HARRISON.

MAILING BLANK 0R SHEET. `APPLICATION FILED NOV. 24, i917.

1,405,131. f Patented Jan.31,1922. y ,Egg/.4.

aff/cf srl/5 ASTITE/YEIW UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

ARTHUR W. HARRISON, 0F WINTHROP, MASSACHUSETTS, ASSIGNOR 0F ONE-HALF TO HERBERT OpFARRINGTON, 0F KITTERY, MAINE.

MAILING BLANK OR SHEET.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Jan. 31, 1922.

Application filed November 24, 1917. Serial No. 203,705.

To @ZZ whom e'z may concern:

Be it known that I, ARTHUR IV. HARRrsox, a citizen of the United States, and resident of lVinthrop, in the county of Suifolk and State of Massachusetts, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Mailing Blanks or Sheets, of which the following' is a specification.

This invention relates to mailing sheets or blanks of the type explained in appl-ication No. l-l-ll filed Jan. 26, 1917 by H. O. Farrington, and consists in the improvements upon, or t-he carrying forward of, the invention claimed in said application, substantially as hereinafter described and claimed.

Of the accompanying drawings:

Figure l is a plan view of a sheet having a form or shape suitable for use when writing a letter with a typewriting machine, with or withouta carbon copy.

Figure 2 is a plan view of a sheet suitable for use as a bill or statement, with flaps which serve for the double purpose of stubs and end closing flaps.

Figure 3 is a plan view of substantially the Fig. l form, partly folded up and with an enclosure which may be a folded return envelope.

Figure 4 is a face view of the Figure l form after it has been folded up and sent through the mail.

Figure 5 is a view from the opposite side, illustrating the two end flaps tucked in differently as hereinafter explained. l

The sheet shownvin Figure l comprises a rectangular central or body portion a having a window b, by which I mean an opening, protected or not by a translucent or transparent strip or an area of the paper which is so treated as tol be sufficiently transparent to permit an address to be read through it. The portion a has two opposite end Haps c, d, and two other opposite aps e, f, which I refer to as the top and bottom flaps respectively, for the reasons presently7 described. Said flaps are preferably made readily foldable by the user by means of creases indicated by the four fine lines which indicate the margins of the section a. Every flap is of less area than section a. so that no flap needs to be doubled or folded upon itself, and two of the flaps (the flaps c and d in the Figure l form) are of less width than the distance from the crease .connected to the backs of is treated to render it more opaque as here# inafter described. Said address indication is so located upon the flap which bears it as to register with the window b when said flap is folded.

The flap j' is weakened near its outer edge,-

as by one or two lines of perforations indicated at z, and the narrow space between said line or lines andthe edge of the flap is preferably rendered adhesive as by such gum as is used on the sealing flaps of envelopes. Such line of gum is indicated at t'. Obviously, when such sheets are to be folded by a machine having means for applying an adhesive to the edge of the flap f, the gum z' may be omitted.

vhile the entire surface of the sheet, including theaps (above line la and excluding the window and the address space) might be used to bear a communication', particularly if it is a printed advertisement or circular, I will describe the use of the Figure l form for a letter written with a typewriting machine.

The sheet is started with the straight upper edge of top flap e leading under the platen of the machine, and a carbon sheet and copy sheet employed at the same time, the same as with any letter to be typed. Of course, the space above the address indication g may be occupied by the usual printed matter of the users letter heads. The address is written in the space g, the date being either above or below that space. Then the letter can proceed over portion and as far down flap f as desired.

'hen the' letter is lto be folded up and sealed. top iap e is folded first, then iaps c and (I and finally bottom flap f is folded and sealed. the portion z' being dhesively all three of the other flaps, as will be readilyunderstood by referring to Figure 5 and imagining that flap (Z of that figure extended the same als flap c instead of under flap e. The reason for showing Hap (Z as'it is in Figure 5 'is to illustrate how one of the end flaps (or both end naps for that matter) might be left so 110 it can be drawn out for examination when the communication is a printed one and mailed under 1 lcent postage. In either event, the sheet can not be folded wrong and sealed, because there is but one line of m and the Hap bearing it must therefore be folded last. This is important in connection with the rip line h because after the recipient opens the communication at 7L the sheet can be readily unfolded to expose the entire inner surface of the sheet intact excepting for the narrow portion z' which would now be stuck to the back of flap e. If the folding has been done as shown at the left in Fig. 5, the said narrow portion connects flaps e and c but can readily be torn transversely.

To facilitate such transverse tearing when the order of folding has been such that flaps c and d are sealed in between flaps e and f, the sealing strip formed by the edge portionof iap f may be transversely weakened as indicated at h' in Fig. 5.

After the article has been unfolded, the iaps c, d, can readily be torn off to facilitate filing the remainder which always bears the identifying post-mark on its back. Of course the opening of the communication mag be effected byrunning a knife or opener un er the flap f close to the sealed portion i, or liftin one end ofthe strip between the two wea ened lines h and removing said strip, or tearing by means of a rip string previously located 'along line h similar to the well-known rip-string envelopes.

If the paper is of a. rat-her thin variety, it is desirable that the portion which is t-o be written upon shall be tinted or otherwise treated to be rendered more opaque, leaving the address receiving space untreated. This not only defines such space but also obstructs reading what is written whenvthe letter has been folded and sealed and is examined from the outside.

As shown in Figure 1 the window I) is near the top of the central portion a, and the address space g is correspondingly near the bottom of iap e, This is important for two v reasons` viz: it provides room for quite an extended letter uninterruptedly from the window down to the rupture line h, and it also meets the postal regulations regarding window envelopes which necessitate the window of an ordinary Asize envelope being much nearer the lower edge than the upper edge of the envelope. Of course it will be readily understood that the line which indicates the crease between portion a and flap e in Fig.- 1 defines the lower edge of the article as it appears in Fig. 4.

In Fig. 3 I have indicated a folded enclosure, which may be a. return envelope.

' Said enclosure is represented as folded along its mid-width, with one portion lying under the inturned aps c, d, and the other nor to use for letter writing or advertisements. In Fig. 2 I show a form suitable for bills or statements, with two of the flaps. providing stubs to correspond with the statement. The central or body portion a having the window b is printed in the form of a statement, for instance a telephone bill. One end flap provides a section c and a section c2k partially divided by 'a weakened line c3. The other end iap d carries the address-indication g adapted to register with window b when folded over. Of the other two iaps e', f', either one may be gummed at z" and weakened at it.

The central portion a and the fiap portion c2 have address spaces in alinement with f window b and with the address space g on flap d so that the sheet can be run through the usual addressing machine in thesame manner now employed for printing the subscribers name and address in three places, on the statement and on the oiiice stub and on the stub which goes to the subscriber with the statement. IYhen the name has been printed as indicated in Fig. 2, and the forms on the statement and stubs have been filled in, the oiice stub c2 is detached for filing, and then the sections or flaps c', d', are folded, then flaps e, and f are folded, and

the communication is then sealed by the,

gummed strip i. all substantially as same as described in connection with the Fig. l form.

The recipient will open the communication in the manner already described, and can readily detach the flaps e f if the statement is to be filed away. One` or both of said flaps may be employed to convey instructions, or information such as toll charges, to the subscriber.

Either form of sheet, when folded, looks like an ordinary envelope, each edge presenting but a single fold, and presenting no more of a slit or opening to catch upon other mail matter than is present in many kinds of envelopes in common use.

The mailing sheet as a whole is so formed, and the address-receiving indication g and the window b are so located relatively to each other, that the user can not so fold the sheet as to result in covering any part of the space wit-hin the indication; and the For some purposes, I do not limit myself to the use of an adhesive for securing the folded sheet, as any other known equivalent means for effecting such result may be elnployed.

Having now described my invention I claim 1. A combined bill or statement and stub adapted lto be mailed without an enclosing envelope, comprisingy a sheet consisting of a rectangular body portion having flaps eX- tending from its margins, saidibody portion having a window and bearing a bill or statement forni, one of the flaps bearing a corresponding stub form, one of the flaps having an address space located to register with said window when said Hap is folded onto the body portion, and one of the flaps having a sealing portion.

2. A combined bill or statement and stub adapted to be mailed without an enclosing envelope, comprising a sheet consisting of a rectangular body portion having flaps extending from its margins, said body portion having a window and bearing a bill or statement form, one of-the flaps being transversely weakened to divideit into inner and outer sections, the outer section bearing a stub form, one of the flaps having an address spa-ce located to register with said window when said flap is folded onto the body portion, and one of the flaps having a sealing portion. v

3. A combined bill or statement and stub adapted to be mailed without an enclosing envelope, comprising a sheet consisting of a rectangular body portion having flaps extending from its margins, said'body portion having a window and bearing a bill or statement form, one of the flaps bearing a corresponding stub form and having an address space to register with said window "when said flap is folded upon the body portion, the said body portion having an address space in alinement with the address space of said stub.

4. A combined bill or statement and stub.

adapted to be mailed without an enclosing envelope, comprising a sheet consisting of a rectangular body port-ion having top, bottom and end flaps, said body portion having a window and form, the end flaps bearing corresponding stub forms, one of said end flaps being transversely weakened to divide it into inner and outer sections, both of said end flaps and the body portion having address spaces in alinement with said window, the top and bottomflaps being adapted to overlap and confine the end aps.

5. A mailing sheet having four creased lines relatively arranged to provide a central rectangular port-ion, a top flap, a bottom flap and two end flaps, the top and bottom flaps having substantially straight parallel edges one of which is gummed entirely across andV all otherl iaps being ungummed and each flap being of less area than the central portion, whereby liability ofincorrect order of folding and sealing is avoided, the gummed Hap edge being of a length to be adhesively connected to all three of the other flaps, the said sheet having at one side of one of its crease lines a window located to register with an address borne by a portion of the sheet at the other side of said crease line when the sheet is folded on said line, the lateral dimensions being less than the distance ARTHUR W. HARRISON.

bearing a bill or statementv of the end lfiapsy from their crease lines to the ends of the window to avoid lia-f

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