Anthony Pollok

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Anthony Pollok (c. 1829 – July 4, 1898) was a European-born American patent attorney who helped Alexander Graham Bell win his early telephone patents. Born in the Austrian Empire around 1828–1829, he studied at the Ecole Centrale in Paris and was made a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honor. Pollok moved to the United States about 1884, built a successful law practice in Washington, D.C., near the Patent Office, and became a leading figure in protecting industrial property. He served as vice-president of the International Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property and testified twice before the U.S. Senate.

Pollok worked with Marcellus Bailey in the law firm Pollok & Bailey, assisting Bell with his patent applications. Gardiner Hubbard, Bell’s patron and future father-in-law, paid Pollok and Bailey to handle Bell’s patents. Pollok was also involved with Hubbard in promoting the “U.S. Postal Telegraph Bill,” which would have created a government monopoly of telegraph lines; the bill did not pass.

After Bell’s patent was approved on February 29, 1876, Bell visited Pollok’s home to celebrate. Bell described Pollok’s residence as unusually grand and noted the company of Washington’s elite. The Alexander Graham Bell Papers at the Library of Congress include Bell’s letters to Pollok and Bailey about the patents.

Pollok and his wife, Marie (born about 1840), were passengers on the steamship SS La Bourgogne when it sank after a collision on July 4, 1898. After their deaths, their heirs established the Anthony Pollok Memorial Prize for the best device to save lives at sea. In November 1898, a sale of the Polloks’ Washington, D.C. estate at 1700 I Street NW was held.