Public Domain Day Releases Copyrighted Works for First Time in 21 Years

Hundreds of Copyrighted Works Finally Enter the Public Domain After 95 Years

By Sara Barnes on January 2, 2019

On January 1, 2019, there was even more to celebrate than the start of a new year. This day saw many published works enter the US public domain for the first time. Literature, music, movies, and more that were created in 1923 are now available for anyone to republish and use in other projects—without asking permission or paying the previous rights holders. Having a creative work in the public domain offers incredible freedom, as it allows us to do things like record new versions of music or recreate artwork. Disney did this, for instance, when it animated public domain fairy tales.

This year’s Public Domain Day on January 1 is a significant one, as it hasn’t happened for over 20 years. The reason is that when works from 1923 were about to enter the public domain in 1999 (a 75-year term), Congress decided to “hit a two-decade pause button” and push the copyright length another 20 years. Called the Copyright Term Extension Act, works published between 1923 and 1977 have 95 years until they enter the domain. Because the pause is over, we’ll now have this day every year, with 1924 works being released in 2020, 1925 in 2021, and so on. Even Mickey Mouse’s first appearance in the 1928 cartoon Steamboat Willie will be part of the public domain in 2024.

Here’s a partial list of works entering the public domain, and you can see a more detailed list from the Center for the Study of Public Domain at Duke Law School.

January 1, 2019 is Public Domain Day. Works published in 1923 are now released of their copyright, meaning anyone can republish or recreate them for free. Here’s some of what you can expect.

Films

See a full list of 1923 films.

The Ten Commandments, directed by Cecil B. DeMille
The Pilgrim, directed by Charlie Chaplin
Safety Last!, directed by Fred C. Newmeyer and Sam Taylor, which features an iconic silent film special effect
Our Hospitality, directed by Buster Keaton and John G. Blystone
Scaramouche, directed by Rex Ingram
Cartoons including Felix the Cat

Music

See a full list of popular music published in 1923.

“Who’s Sorry Now?”
“That Old Gang of Mine”
“Yes! We Have No Bananas”
“Tin Roof Blues”
“King Porter Stomp”

Sigmund Freud (Photo: Max Halberstadt [Public domain])

Literature

These are the 200 most popular books of 1923.

The Ego and the Id by Sigmund Freud
Towards a New Architecture by Le Corbusier
The Murder on the Links and The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie
“Mrs. Dalloway in Bond Street” by Virginia Woolf
Bambi by Felix Salten and illustrated by Barbara Cooney, which was the source material for the Disney animated film
Short stories by iconic authors including Virginia Woolf, H.P. Lovecraft, and Ernest Hemingway

“On White II” by Wassily Kandinski

Art

Here are significant artworks created in 1923.

Bird in Space by Constantin Brâncuși
Odalisque With Raised Arms by Henri Matisse
The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even (The Large Glass) by Marcel Duchamp
Dolphins (woodcut) by M. C. Escher
On White II by Wassily Kandinsky
The Pipes of Pan and Paulo on a Donkey by Pablo Picasso