Bates numbering

The Bates Automatic Numbering-Machine or Bates stamper is named after the inventor Edwin Granville Bates of New York City. The mechanism -- an improvement patented by Edwin G. Bates in 1891 -- automatically changed the number, making quick work for staff. and in 1895 he received a Longstreth award from the Franklin Institute for his invention of a typographic number machine. The earliest patent claimed a "new and useful improvement in Consecutive-Numbering Machines", indicating that Bates was not the originator of the idea. Operating as Bates Manufacturing Company since its incorporation in 1890, File:Bates.png|Bates Numbering Machine in the Newspaper File:Bates2.png|Bates Numbering Machine in the Newspaper File:Bates5.png|Bates Numbering Machine in the Newspaper File:Bates3.png|Bates Numbering Machine in the Newspaper File:Bates8.png|Bates Numbering Machine in the Newspaper ==Usage==

Bates numbering is commonly used as an organizational method to label and identify legal documents. Nearly all American law firms use Bates stamps, though the use of manual hand-stamping is becoming increasingly rare because of the rise in electronic numbering, mostly in Portable Document Format (PDF) files rather than printed material. Bates numbering is neither universally used nor consistently applied; for example, The Bluebook style guide does not reference it. But, consistent with The Bluebook, the first citation should make it very clear what is being referenced, such as (Bates Jones000001) or (Bates d123-002), and subsequent consecutive cites should follow the usual practice of Id. followed by the page number, such as (Id. 000017) or (Id. -017). ==See also==