4224

The film '4224' is a documentary/industrial film produced in 1962 for the Southern Pacific Railroad, documenting the rebuilding of a steam locomotive at the Sacramento shops. Under the 1909 Copyright Act, works published in the US between 1928 and 1963 required a copyright renewal filing in the 28th year to maintain protection. A search of the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database and the Library of Congress Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE) reveals no renewal registration for a film of this title or for this specific production by Southern Pacific. Works from this era that were not renewed entered the public domain 28 years after their initial registration or publication. Without a renewal filing between 1989 and 1990, the work lapsed into the public domain. Furthermore, many industrial and corporate films of this era were either published without a formal copyright notice (omitting the '©' symbol, year, and name) or were never registered with the Copyright Office. The film is currently widely available on public archival platforms like the Internet Archive and via public domain stock footage libraries without copyright claims from the successor to Southern Pacific (Union Pacific).