{
  "patent_number": "US 271363",
  "country": "US",
  "title": "How James Ritty's First Cash Register Tracked Sales",
  "original_title": "Cash register and indicator",
  "summary": "This 1883 patent describes an early mechanical cash register invented by James Ritty, designed to record sales transactions and display the total amount, helping businesses prevent employee theft and track daily income.",
  "what_it_does": "This patent describes a mechanical device, a 'cash register and indicator,' designed to record money transactions. It likely involved a series of keys, each representing a specific amount, which, when pressed, would add that amount to a running total. The 'indicator' part suggests a visible display that would show the current total or the last entered amount. For example, a shopkeeper could press keys for '5 cents' and '10 cents' for a sale, and the machine would internally sum these and show the total to the customer and the shopkeeper, preventing errors or dishonest handling of cash.",
  "what_it_does_not_cover": [
    "Does not cover electronic cash registers with digital displays.",
    "Does not cover systems that print receipts for customers.",
    "Does not cover machines that automatically dispense change.",
    "Does not cover integrated point-of-sale systems with inventory management.",
    "Does not cover networked cash registers that send data to a central server."
  ],
  "filed": null,
  "granted": "1883-01-30",
  "expires": null,
  "status": "active",
  "holder": "James Ritty",
  "holder_url": "https://patentbrief.org/company/james-ritty",
  "inventors": [],
  "times_cited": 0,
  "tags": [
    "mechanical",
    "retail",
    "finance"
  ],
  "abstract": null,
  "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/271363/cash-register-ritty",
  "markdown_url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/271363/cash-register-ritty/md",
  "google_patents_url": "https://patents.google.com/patent/US271363",
  "relatedPatents": [
    {
      "patentNumber": "388116",
      "countryCode": "US",
      "title": "How William Burroughs Invented the First Practical Adding Machine",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/388116/adding-machine-burroughs"
    },
    {
      "patentNumber": "90646",
      "countryCode": "US",
      "title": "Edison's First Patent: An Electric Vote Recorder",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/90646/edison-first-patent-vote-recorder"
    },
    {
      "patentNumber": "3761682",
      "countryCode": "US",
      "title": "Early Automatic Cash Dispenser Using Credit Cards",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/3761682/atm-cash-dispenser"
    },
    {
      "patentNumber": "3819921",
      "countryCode": "US",
      "title": "How Texas Instruments Invented the Handheld Electronic Calculator",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/3819921/barcode-upc-scanner"
    },
    {
      "patentNumber": "3055113",
      "countryCode": "US",
      "title": "Early Device for Tracking Objects with a Pen",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/3055113/etch-a-sketch"
    }
  ]
}