One of the first things you learn in journalism school is not to refer to a photocopy as a Xerox, or a tissue as a Kleenex, or a coin-operated laundry as a Laundromat.

That’s because Xerox, Kleenex and Laundromat are registered trademarks and the companies that own those trademarks will protect them aggressively. Confuse a photocopy for a "Xerox" in your published story and you’re likely to get a very nasty letter from a lawyer from the company.

The companies fear that assimilation of their names with the products they produce will render their company names generic. If we come to think of all photocopies as Xeroxes — which they are not — then Xerox might lose the exclusive right to the use of its own name.

But what happens when a trademark is also the name of the town in which the company is located? Pinehurst, for example? There, Pinehurst Inc., the company which owns the famous hotel and golf courses is trying to protect its trademark. It has already forced two small businesses to stop using "Pinehurst" in their company names.

Local folk are upset. They say they can use the name Pinehurst for their businesses just like the Raleigh Car Repair can use "Raleigh," or Durham Cafe can use "Durham." Pinehurst, they claim, is a geographic name and therefore it cannot be used in a protected trademark.

The Village of Pinehurst, which was settled and named in 1895, several years before the resort opened, doesn’t have to worry about a trademark infringement. It is fine. But village leaders are upset with the resort owners, so they’ve dragged them into court. They want the brouhaha to end and the local businesses given back the right to use "Pinehurst" in their names.

Given the history of the village and the resort — they were both founded by the same man — it is understandable that the corporation wants to protect its trademark from other resorts in the area. Other golf courses, for example, would appear to be violating the company’s trademark if, for example, they called themselves "Pinehust Number Two."

But the court in this case will have to look beyond the wishes of this one company and to the rights of local residents to use their village’s name as they see fit. An interior decorator should have every right in the world to refer to her company as Pinehurst Decorating and Wallpaper if she is, in fact, located in that village.

Businesses have a good reason for identifying with their town. By doing so, they tell potential customers their location, and they also identify themselves as a local business. Pinehurst Inc. should have no authority to take those rights away from owners of their fellow local businesses.

This is an uncommon situation. There are probably few other towns in America where the name of the dominant industry and the town are so closely connected. That’s the root of Pinehurst Inc.’s problem. In effect, the resort owner failed to protect its trademark over the years by allowing the Village of Pinehurst to grow into something more than a golf course and hotel. It may not have had the power to stop that growth, but now there seems to be little the company can fairly do to stop other businesses from using the word "Pinehurst" to identify a dog grooming shop.

Paul T. O’Connor is a Raleigh columnist for the Capitol Press Association.