Union Pacific sues local photographer

[Scooterb]

Wondered when this would haappen

Glenn Bohn
Vancouver Sun

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

CREDIT: Mark Van Manen, Vancouver Sun
Renate Huxtable shows some of her son's photographs and calendars
featuring Union Pacific trains.

WEST VANCOUVER - A local photographer with a passion for old trains is
being sued by Union Pacific Railway, the largest railway corporation in
North America, over a calendar featuring its trains.

Union Pacific -- whose red, white and blue logo has red and white
stripes just like the U.S. flag -- alleges Nils Huxtable violated the
company's exclusive right to use its Union Pacific trademark and design
by producing and selling a "Union Pacific" calendar.

A website soliciting money for Huxtable's legal defence says "the
artistic rights of railroad photographers are under attack."

Union Pacific, which built part of the first trans-continental railway
across the U.S. and holds one of the oldest corporate trademarks in the
U.S., disagrees.

Brenda Mainwaring, the company's director of corporate relations, says
Union Pacific isn't disputing the right of people to take photographs of
its trains but will take measures to protect its trademark, logo and its
name.

Mainwaring said the company has authorized more than 100 companies to
use its trademark for various products, including calendars, but
Huxtable made use of the company name without its permission.

"It's important for any company to protect their trademarks," Mainwaring
said in an interview Monday from the company's headquarters in Nebraska.

"A great deal of the value of a company is in its name and reputation.
Therefore, it has to protect the way its name and reputation is
portrayed."

Nils Huxtable couldn't be reached for comment about the lawsuit, which
could go to trial this June.

His mother, who said her son is in Cuba at a train festival, said the
lawsuit is "completely stupid."

"He's been involved in these calendars for the last eight years and
nothing ever came about that would warrant something like this," said
Renate Huxtable, who does some work for her son's business but is not
named in the lawsuit.

"I get a little under the weather when I talk about it, because it's so
unjust. This started last April and it's just been building up and up,
giving us both a lot of stress."

Nils Huxtable refers to his lifelong love for photographing steam-
powered and diesel trains in the legal document that outlines his
defence.

The statement of facts calls Huxtable "one of the world's most highly
renowned railroad photographers." It notes the 56-year-old man took his
first railroad photograph in Great Britain, in 1961, when he was just
11. He shot his first photo of a Union Pacific train in 1964, in
Wyoming.

By 1970, his photographs and articles about trains were being published
in the international circulation magazines read by train worshippers.
Huxtable's photos appeared on postcards and posters, as well as in at
least a dozen books. And, since 1994, he's been producing and publishing
an annual "Union Pacific calendar" described as a "Steamscenes
Publication."

Huxtable argued that his calendars are distinguishable from the
calendars produced by Union Pacific, which depict modern trains. He
contrasted those photos of new trains with his "classic images of
historically significant Union Pacific trains, captured in beautiful
settings, by the world's finest railroad photographers, with historical
notes and background information."

[Scooterb]

Maybe we need to edit our pics.


Yea.uncle pete I gots a photographer here at Butler taking pics we need to get some royalties from him.

[SousaKerry]

UP is definatly getting too big for it's corporate briches and apparently the tightness is cutting off the bloodflow to their brains:-) LEAVE THE LITTLE GUY ALONE UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Why don't they worry more about their real job running trains and buying everything in sight (the heck with diversity just paint everthing baby s@#! yellow) then they can charge us all royalties for every picture we take.


sorry enough rant for now

BTW did anyone else notice that guys last name Huxtable as in the old Cosby show, wonder if you get free pudding with every callender

[Railzfan]

That is the most STUPID reason to sue someone that I have ever heard! You would think that since he was promoting the Underly Pathetic (UP) that they wouldn’t care, but, unless it has $$$$$$$$ in it for them they don’t like it. Maybe if we are lucky BNSF will nock out the only two rotten RR companies, CN and UP!

I am anti UP!

***END OF TRANSMISSION***

[Aleks]

Scott, you better hope UP doesn't see that photo or they may sue for defacing their emblem. LOL
Funny how people can deface their units with graffiti and they let them roam the system like that but heaven forbid someone take a photoand publish it for Joe public to see.
Incredible, just incredible!!!