David Lowell Ladd, Commissioner of Patents in the Kennedy Adminstration, died last week at the age of 68. He served as commissioner from April 1961 to September 1963. During his administration, the 3,000,000th patent was issued. While as Commissioner, he reorganized the PTO and set up a training program for all staff examiners. In 1962, he co-authored a study that led to the creation of the World Intellectual Property Organization, a UN agency in Geneva that amongst other things manages the Patent Cooperation Treaty, an extremely useful system for maintaining patent priority rights globally. After heading the PTO, Mr. Ladd continued to practice patent law, teach at Ohio University and the University of Miami. From 1980 to 1985, he was United States Register of Copyrights at the Library of Congress. He then went to work for the Washington law firm of Wiley, Rein & Fielding, before retiring in 1987. Greg Aharonian Internet Patent News Service