Letter: Name your price, price your name

Sir: Miles Kington ('Bloodthirsty beasts on the loose - and dinosaurs as well', 6 July) rightly draws attention to the growing habit in the United States of seeing trademark protection on place names. Perhaps we should be concerned at the effect this practice is beginning to have on some of our own cherished names.

Reproductions of London Transport's posters have enjoyed a steady sale in the US for many years. You might perhaps share our surprise recently when a certain well-known tennis club threatened action to prevent the sale of copies of a Thirties poster promoting travel to its ground, on the basis that 'Wimbledon' is a registered US trademark.

Where will this end? Will underground trains have to cease admitting they go to 'Oval' or 'Arsenal'? Might the 'Cockfosters' parish council demand a royalty each time a Piccadilly line train announces its destination?

Yours sincerely

(but fully protected),

ANDREW J. SCOTT

Director

London Transport Museum

London, WC2