A woman who claims that her uncle invented the New York Yankees’ top hat logo filed a lawsuit against the team this week, according to media reports.
Tanit Buday, 63, filed the claim in a New York federal court on Monday and says the team should give all profits that were made via the logo to her, Reuters reported.
The Yankees logo, which features a red, white and blue top hat sitting atop a baseball bat, is prominently featured in much of the team’s merchandising.
Buday said that her uncle Kenneth Timur was a designer whom the Yankees called on to make the famous logo, but was never credited or paid for it. Timur lived in Europe at the time and did not know that the logo was used by the Yankees until he moved to the U.S. in 1947 and was asked to revise the logo, reported CNN.
Rob Wallace, a design analyst, viewed Timur’s work and said it is “evident that they are so significantly similar that they could not have been created independently from one another," according to CNN.
Yankee spokeswoman Alice McGillion said Timur’s claims have no validity or proof.
"This is a wonderful country where anybody can sue for anything, even when the allegations are over 70 years old," she told the New York Post.
