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Posted By: Mike Masinick

All public records (models) were sold to the public back a few decades ago. The patent office no longer holds any models except for a few specific and important inventions in their museum. It is possible to look at the prosecution history of old cases (paperwork), but it's certainly not as simple as walking up to the PTO and asking to see the records. They are all stored in an underground vault in West Virginia (or so I've heard) and must be specially ordered. I was unable to view the records of a 1795 patent that I wanted to view a few years ago because they were "unavailable" (IE: Lost)... too bad, it was a cool patent too.