The Whalers Logo, It's not owned by who you'd suspect...

I'm sad to say that it does not appear the City of Hartford or the CDA owns the Whalers logo anymore. This next part will peeve you even more:


I did a quick search of the US Patent and Trademark Office website and the current owner of the HW-Whale tail logo is....the Carolina Hurricanes.

LINK HERE

Whoever had been the owner let the rights lapse in 1999, and the Hurricanes scooped up the rights on September 30, 2001, for a term of 10 years.


Ah yes, and this is my first post here. Hate to be the bringer of bad news. I'm sure if and when the Whalers return, we'll work out some sort of deal for the logo. The Hurricanes actually don't own the wordmark "Hartford Whalers" or even the Pucky logo, just the HW-Whale tail logo.

Damn, that sucks. That date coincides with the Whalers logos and uniforms disappearing from hockey video games, too. I always thought that came from Hartford not wanting Whalers stuff to be associated with the Hurricanes.

damn

We still have pucky!! Let's look on the brite side!

I'm not sure this is true. You can't buy a whalers jersey when you can buy any other type of throwback jersey, the logo isn't used in NHL video games where any other defunct team is represented. Not only this, but it hasn't been used for years so the Canes coming into control of it in 2001 and never using it, especially when Karmanos owns the rights just doesn't make sense. He'd milk that opportunity for all it's worth.

Edit: Searching the trademarks I only saw the plymouth whalers as live trademarks with any hockey relation.

I didn't know the link would expire. Here's how you get to the entry (detailed instructions below):

1. Go to http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=tess&state=cu7kd.1.1

2. Click on "New User Search Form (Basic)" (the first link)

3. Enter "Hartford Whalers" as your search term (but do not submit your query yet)

4. Change the "field" drop-down menu from "Combined Word Mark" to "ALL"

5. Now submit your query.

6. Result Number 7 is the culprit (Serial number: 73237792; Reg. Number:1161394). It is a live trademark.

well we can use the conn. whalers jersey logo

now i don't know anything about buying and selling trademarks, but if the 'canes bought the rights for 10 years in 2001, that means that they would be available again in 2001, right? and as much as i would love to see it happen, the way things are looking it doesnt appear that hartford will be getting an nhl team within the next 4 years. so couldn't we buy the copyright back then?

for the right price

I agree. I saw this a while ago, and I think it's a mistake. I still think the State owns it,

I did some investigation and found this out:

Karmanos doesn't own it,but rather the NHL. Seems when the Whale were leaving the state they thought it was getting something of value from Karmanos in the rights to HW logo.

He didn't have the legal authority to do so. Once the team was transferred the name went to the league who hold the marketing and licensing rights of NHL products. So Karmanos duped the CBA !! They have something completely worthless. So nobody can use the name Hartford Whalers in the NHL or AHL.

...pretty sad huh? Only one person worse than Karmonos owning our logo. Gary Bettman