In 1877 Mr. Dexter was issued a patent for his invention from the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO). There were 2 documents on file for this patent. The drawing specification sheet of the patent has been reproduced from original USPTO documents and printed onto parchment paper. This print is sized and ready to install into an 8" x 10" frame. The additional sheets included are printed on 5.50" x 8.50" parchment paper. These accompanying documents describe the scope of this invention in formal terms. The following is an actual excerpt from the patent…

       " Be it known that I, DEXTER W. PARKER, of Meriden, in the county of New Haven and State of Connecticut, have invented a new Improvement in Coffee-Mills; and I do hereby declare the following, when taken in connection with the accompanying drawings and the letters of reference marked thereon, to be a full, clear, and exact description of the same, and which said drawings constitute part of this specification, and represent a vertical central section. This invention relates to an improvement in that class of grinding-mills commonly known as “box or hand mills,” and in which the runners are mounted on a vertical spindle provided with a crank for turning in a horizontal plane, and specially to that class in which two runners are employed with the different shells, the upper as a cracker and the lower as a grinder."…