What happens to copyright after death?

[HotelGM]

I live in Ohio.

Back in 1986, my grandmother published a cookbook, and the copyright is in her name. The recipes were ones passed down from generation to generation, and ones given to my grandmother and her sisters over the years. The cookbook was sold mostly in tourist-type stores in Ohio and Oregon, as there are family ties to both states.
There was a second printing in 2002, with recipes from the younger generation added. It was a much smaller run as it was printed for our family reunion.

Grandma passed away in 2010. My cousins and I now have grandchildren, and would love to be able to make sure they (as well as their children and grandchildren) are able to have their own cookbook. We would like to have more cookbooks printed.
What happens to a copyright after death?
What do we have to do to be able to have more cookbooks printed?

 

[adjusterjack]

The following is from the US Copyright Office website:

As a general rule, for works created after January 1, 1978, copyright protection lasts for the life of the author plus an additional 70 years.

How Long Does Copyright Protection Last? (FAQ) | U.S. Copyright Office

The following is from US Code Section 201 - Ownership of Copyright:

(d)Transfer of Ownership.—
(1)The ownership of a copyright may be transferred in whole or in part by any means of conveyance or by operation of law, and may be bequeathed by will or pass as personal property by the applicable laws of intestate succession.

17 U.S. Code § 201 - Ownership of copyright | U.S. Code | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute (cornell.edu)

When Grandma died in 2010, did she have a will? Did the will specify who inherited the copyright? That person would have the right to publish and distribute additional cookbooks.

If no will, or the copyright was omitted from the will, then the copyright is subject to Ohio's law of intestate succession.

Section 2105.06 - Ohio Revised Code | Ohio Laws

When her estate was probated, the copyright should have been addressed during probate.

That's the "legal" stuff.

If nobody in the family has any objections, avoid the "legal" hassle and find a local bookbinder who can run you as many copies as you want for distribution to relatives. Better yet, avoid the cost and make an eBook that you can email.

If you want to resume selling the book, you might have to address the inheritance issue with an attorney.

 

[quincy]

I live in Ohio.

Back in 1986, my grandmother published a cookbook, and the copyright is in her name. The recipes were ones passed down from generation to generation, and ones given to my grandmother and her sisters over the years. The cookbook was sold mostly in tourist-type stores in Ohio and Oregon, as there are family ties to both states.
There was a second printing in 2002, with recipes from the younger generation added. It was a much smaller run as it was printed for our family reunion.

Grandma passed away in 2010. My cousins and I now have grandchildren, and would love to be able to make sure they (as well as their children and grandchildren) are able to have their own cookbook. We would like to have more cookbooks printed.
What happens to a copyright after death?
What do we have to do to be able to have more cookbooks printed?

First, a copyright owner has the exclusive right to reproduce (or copy) the work, prepare derivative works and distribute copies of the work (as well as perform and display a work). A copyright owner also has the right to grant or transfer some or all limited or exclusive rights in the work to others. An author’s copyright survives the author’s death by 70 years.

Because copyrights are personal property (assets), upon an author’s death they become part of a deceased person’s estate. If no one but your grandmother held any exclusive rights in the cookbook, the heir or heirs potentially could publish and distribute new copies of the cookbook.

However, the publisher of the cookbook would have been granted by your grandmother at least some rights in the cookbook in order to print, publish and/or distribute the cookbook. If these were exclusive rights granted to the publisher to print, publish and/or distribute the book, you and/or the other heirs (whoever inherited rights to the work) would need permission from the publisher to make new copies.

Therefore, you first need to determine who (besides family members) might hold rights in the work and what rights they hold. You could start your research by contacting the original publisher. If your grandmother registered her copyright with the US Copyright Office, there can be additional information found there (Copyright Search: https://www.copyright.gov/public-records/ and How to Investigate the Copyright Status of a Work: https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ22.pdf)

 

[quincy]

... If nobody in the family has any objections, avoid the "legal" hassle and find a local bookbinder who can run you as many copies as you want for distribution to relatives. Better yet, avoid the cost and make an eBook that you can email. ...

HotelGM, don’t do what I have bolded above. You not only will not avoid legal hassles, you could find yourself with a big legal copyright infringement headache. You must determine who holds the rights in the cookbook first.

 

[HotelGM]

Thank you for your responses. I should have mentioned that while I live in Ohio, my grandma lived in Oregon when she published the book.

I have an uncle who lives in Oregon. I called him to ask if he knew about the copyright. He does not recall anything mentioned about it when they were settling her estate after her death, but he does have a copy of her will, and is going to read through it to see if the copyright is mentioned.

 

[quincy]

Thank you for your responses. I should have mentioned that while I live in Ohio, my grandma lived in Oregon when she published the book.

I have an uncle who lives in Oregon. I called him to ask if he knew about the copyright. He does not recall anything mentioned about it when they were settling her estate after her death, but he does have a copy of her will, and is going to read through it to see if the copyright is mentioned.

Reading the will can help you learn if any specifically-named person (family member) acquired your grandmother’s copyrights in the cookbook. There will still need to be an investigation into the publisher’s (or anyone else’s) rights in the cookbook.

Because copyrights are protected under federal copyright laws, in what state the book was written or published should not be a factor in determining who owns the copyrights.

 

[adjusterjack]

Because copyrights are protected under federal copyright laws, in what state the book was written or published should not be a factor in determining who owns the copyrights.

Federal law allows a copyright to be transferred by will or intestacy which are issues of state law. The state where Grandma resided at the time of her death matters.

 

[LdiJ]

I live in Ohio.

Back in 1986, my grandmother published a cookbook, and the copyright is in her name. The recipes were ones passed down from generation to generation, and ones given to my grandmother and her sisters over the years. The cookbook was sold mostly in tourist-type stores in Ohio and Oregon, as there are family ties to both states.
There was a second printing in 2002, with recipes from the younger generation added. It was a much smaller run as it was printed for our family reunion.

Grandma passed away in 2010. My cousins and I now have grandchildren, and would love to be able to make sure they (as well as their children and grandchildren) are able to have their own cookbook. We would like to have more cookbooks printed.
What happens to a copyright after death?
What do we have to do to be able to have more cookbooks printed?

A copyright lasts until the death of the author plus 70 years. So the copyright on that cookbook would last until 2080. Once grandma passed away the copyright became the property of her estate, which would then have become the property of her heirs. Therefore her heirs would have the right to either reprint the cookbook or give permission for it to be reprinted.

At this point, unless one of your cousins is greedy and somehow thinks that there is money to be made off this cookbook, as long as you all are in agreement, more copies can be printed for the younger generation.

 

[quincy]

First, the heirs may not be the only ones who hold rights in the cookbook. A publisher of the cookbook can also have rights, including an exclusive right to reproduce the book.

HotelGM, have any of your grandmother’s cookbooks been sold since her death? If so, to whom have the proceeds been paid?

 

[LdiJ]

First, the heirs may not be the only ones who hold rights in the cookbook. A publisher of the cookbook can also have rights, including an exclusive right to reproduce the book.

HotelGM, have any of your grandmother’s cookbooks been sold since her death? If so, to whom have the proceeds been paid?

The OP specifically states that the copyright is in the grandmother's name, so I took the OP's word on that. In addition, I suspect is was self published. There was self publishing in the 1980's. It did not work exactly the same the way that it works today, but it did exist and was relatively prevalent.

 

[quincy]

The OP specifically states that the copyright is in the grandmother's name, so I took the OP's word on that. In addition, I suspect is was self published. There was self publishing in the 1980's. It did not work exactly the same the way that it works today, but it did exist and was relatively prevalent.

There can be more than one copyright holder in a work and, in the case of published books, there often is. Authors must grant rights to publishers to actually make copies of their books. Making copies (reproducing a copyright-protected work) is one of the exclusive rights held by a copyright owner.

Without this grant of rights, making copies is copyright infringement.

The question then becomes (if grandma did not print off copies of the book herself), what rights was the publisher granted - a limited right or an exclusive right.

If an exclusive right to publishing was granted to the publisher, copies cannot be made without permission of the publisher. Otherwise it would be infringing on the exclusive rights of the publisher. If a limited right was granted to a publisher - limited perhaps to a first run, then again for a second run - then no rights were transferred and the current copyright holder is free to reprint the cookbook.

It is, as a note, not the recipes themselves that are protected in a cookbook. It is the specific compilation of recipes and any original and creative content (e.g., photos, anecdotes) that are protected. Recipes are considered facts and are not subject to copyright.

One avenue open for HotelGM to explore is to create a completely new cookbook using a different group of family recipes and new creative content (e.g., all new photos). Of course, it probably is the original compilation and original material that is the family treasure. If that is the case, copyright ownership needs to be determined before copying the book.

 

[zddoodah]

Back in 1986, my grandmother published a cookbook, and the copyright is in her name. The recipes were ones passed down from generation to generation, and ones given to my grandmother and her sisters over the years.

Before proceeding, I'm going to ask a couple of questions and take a second to address some important issues.

Did your grandmother register the copyright with the Copyright Office in D.C.?

Who published the cookbook? Did your grandmother enter into a contract with the publisher? If so, does it say anything about copyright ownership?

It does not sound like your grandmother was the author of any of the recipes, which means she had no rights of copyright (unless those rights were transferred to her).

The extent of copyright protection in a recipe is minimal since a mere recipe is nothing more than a list of ingredients. It is possible, however, that some of the accompanying written text might be protected, but that would require a case by case inquiry.

It is likely that the extent of the protection for the book as a whole is limited to the selection and arrangement of the recipes.

What happens to a copyright after death?

Any rights of copyright owned by your grandmother will remain in force until 2080. 17 U.S.C. section 302(a) ("Copyright in a work created on or after January 1, 1978, subsists from its creation and, except as provided by the following subsections, endures for a term consisting of the life of the author and 70 years after the author’s death."). As for who owns the rights now, that depends on the disposition of her estate following her death in 2010.

What do we have to do to be able to have more cookbooks printed?

That's going to depend, in large part on how you answer my questions about the initial publication of the book.

he does have a copy of her will, and is going to read through it to see if the copyright is mentioned.

If the copyright is not mentioned expressly, then it's important to note what the residuary clause says (a residuary clause is a provision in a will that says what happens to assets of the estate that are not expressly mentioned elsewhere in the will).

 

[HotelGM]

Before proceeding, I'm going to ask a couple of questions and take a second to address some important issues.

Did your grandmother register the copyright with the Copyright Office in D.C.?

I don't know.

Who published the cookbook? Did your grandmother enter into a contract with the publisher? If so, does it say anything about copyright ownership?

I'm thinking it was self printed. On the first inside page of the cookbook, it reads:

Copyright 1986
(My grandmother's name)
(My grandmother's address)
Printed in the United States of America

The only other pages in the book that are not recipes, stories, or artwork, are order forms in the back of the book, and grandma's address is on those, so if someone sent an order form, it would have gone to her, and she would have shipped the book to the buyer. There is also an acknowledgements page, thanking a couple of her friends and a couple of family members for their help and encouragement.

It does not sound like your grandmother was the author of any of the recipes, which means she had no rights of copyright (unless those rights were transferred to her).

The extent of copyright protection in a recipe is minimal since a mere recipe is nothing more than a list of ingredients. It is possible, however, that some of the accompanying written text might be protected, but that would require a case by case inquiry.

It is likely that the extent of the protection for the book as a whole is limited to the selection and arrangement of the recipes.




Any rights of copyright owned by your grandmother will remain in force until 2080. 17 U.S.C. section 302(a) ("Copyright in a work created on or after January 1, 1978, subsists from its creation and, except as provided by the following subsections, endures for a term consisting of the life of the author and 70 years after the author’s death."). As for who owns the rights now, that depends on the disposition of her estate following her death in 2010.




That's going to depend, in large part on how you answer my questions about the initial publication of the book.




If the copyright is not mentioned expressly, then it's important to note what the residuary clause says (a residuary clause is a provision in a will that says what happens to assets of the estate that are not expressly mentioned elsewhere in the will). [\QUOTE]

 

[LdiJ]

I don't know.



I'm thinking it was self printed. On the first inside page of the cookbook, it reads:

Copyright 1986
(My grandmother's name)
(My grandmother's address)
Printed in the United States of America

The only other pages in the book that are not recipes, stories, or artwork, are order forms in the back of the book, and grandma's address is on those, so if someone sent an order form, it would have gone to her, and she would have shipped the book to the buyer. There is also an acknowledgements page, thanking a couple of her friends and a couple of family members for their help and encouragement.

I suspected that it was self published. Based on what was printed on the first inside page and the order form, it clearly was self published. That means that no publisher (other than your grandma) had any rights to the cookbook, so we are back to the point where if the heirs are in agreement for it be reprinted for the next generations, then there shouldn't be any problem doing so. Of course, if the will give the rights to the book to one specific family member, then its that family member who has to consent. However, if you are at all unclear as to who that is, then just make sure that everybody agrees.

 

[zddoodah]

I don't know.

I'm thinking it was self printed. On the first inside page of the cookbook, it reads:

Copyright 1986
(My grandmother's name)
(My grandmother's address)
Printed in the United States of America

The only other pages in the book that are not recipes, stories, or artwork, are order forms in the back of the book, and grandma's address is on those, so if someone sent an order form, it would have gone to her, and she would have shipped the book to the buyer. There is also an acknowledgements page, thanking a couple of her friends and a couple of family members for their help and encouragement.

OK. I generally agree with what LdiJ wrote, but it kinda sounds like you may be overthinking this. Do any of your grandmother's living issue (children, grandchildren, etc.) care about the copyright in the book? Even if someone does care, if the copyright isn't registered and all you do is make copies to give away to relatives, then there's virtually no risk of any legal action because there would be no actionable damages.