Chains

The film 'Chains' (1949) is a US-produced short film, primarily recognized as a corporate or industrial film produced for the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway. Under the US Copyright Act of 1909, works published between 1928 and 1963 required a copyright renewal filing during the 28th year of their initial term to maintain protection. A search of the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database (which covers renewals for films from this era) and the Library of Congress Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE) reveals no renewal registration for this title. Industrial and corporate films from the 1940s were rarely renewed unless they had significant theatrical distribution or commercial television potential, which was not the case for this internal or promotional railway film. Because no renewal record exists, the copyright expired at the end of its first 28-year term in 1977. Consequently, the work is now in the public domain in the United States. This status is common for the vast majority of ephemeral and industrial films from the late 1940s.