visiting a customer in Denver and carrying the card of Thurston & .Braidich, instead of that of an unknown firm? Was there no advantage in possessing a list of 1,000 consumers who had dealt in the past with Thurston & Braidich, and in seeking a continuance thereof, when the customer knew nothing more than that the same firm sought to sell goods to him? If the writers of mail orders or the foreign customers of Thurston & Braidich did not depend upon the display of goods or on personal contact with the firm in New York, what drew their custom to that business house? Thurston & Braidich certainly had, in the words of Vann, J., supra, ‘a name known to the trade.’ ”
So here the name was known to the trade. To establish #s standing in the business world and to acquire its extensive patronage must have required the expenditure of considerable money and effort. This does not come to naught upon the expiration of the charter. Its value belongs to those at whose instance it was created—the stockholders of the old corporation. It can no more be appropriated without compensation than can the value attaching to tangible assets. The expiration of a corporate charter does not make the good will of the business a legitimate subject of appropriation by the most vigilant.
The defendants contend that a distinction must be made which will differentiate the holding in the Wisconsin case of Rusk v. Lindemann, supra, and the Iowa case of Rossing v. State Bank, supra, to the contrary, and that the distinguishing feature is that, under a statute like that existing in Wisconsin, the corporation continues its corporate character for a given time after the expiration of the charter, whereas under § 4567, C. L., N. D., continuing corporate character is not recognized or provided for. It is clear to us that there is no ground for such a distinction. The statute of Iowa likewise recognized the continuance of the corporation (Code Iowa 1897, § 1629), but yet it was there held, as pointed out above and contrary to the Wisconsin decision, that there is no good will to be accounted for upon the expiration of the charter of a bank. It seems obvious to us that the value attaching to the good will of the corporate business at dissolution does not depend in the least for its realization upon statutory recognition or nonrecognition of the continuance of the corporation for the limited purpose of liquidation. Such recognition is only a brief and convenient mode of authorizing or validating transactions which can most readily be conducted in the corporate name. Even under § 4567, C. L., N. D. permission is given to use
