reported that: "The Sun Record Company of Memphis agreed to pay $2,080 to a Texas Recording firm because its blues tune, Bear Cat, is too similar to Hound Dog. Lion Publishing Company of Houston, Tex., won the out-of-court settlement after contending in a court suit that Bear Cat was a "conscious imitation" of their own recording with "only minor variations." Sam C. Phillips of Sun Record agreed to pay Hound Dog owners two cents per record for 79,000 waxings of Bear Cat already sold and two cents a record for future sales. On July 8 Robey wrote to Phillips again, thanking him "kindly for your co-operation in this matter", but Phillips still refused to purchase a mechanical license for Thomas' "Bear Cat". Robey then instructed his company lawyer Irving Marcus to sue Phillips and Sun Records,James M. Salem, The Late, Great Johnny Ace and the Transition from R & B to Rock 'n' Roll' (University of Illinois Press, 2001) pp. 84–85. hoping to use this as a test case to determine the legal status of all answer songs. While earlier pressings of Sun 181 bore the caption "(The Answer To Hound Dog)" above the A-side title, as a result of the legal action this was removed from all later pressings. In the 1980s, Sam Phillips conceded: "I should have known better. The melody was exactly the same as theirs, but we claimed the credit for writing the damn thing". King Records vs Lion Publishing Co. and Lion Publishing Co. vs King Records & Valjo Music (1953) In late July 1953 Syd Nathan, president of King Records, took Robey and his Lion Publishing Company to court. The August 1, 1953 BillBoard reported: "Lion [Music] itself was in court defending the contention of in Cincinnati that he had an interest in the song 'Hound Dog' and should have a fifty per cent share of its success." Nathan claimed that Valjo Music, one of King Records' publishing affiliates, had legal rights to the song as Johnny Otis, who claimed to be a co-author, was under exclusive contract to them at the time. An article entitled "New Howl Goes Up Over 'Hound Dog' Infringement" in The Pittsburgh Courier of August 8, 1953 reported: You ain't nothin' but a hound dog" is becoming a battle cry faster than a pup can clean a bone. "Hound Dog" has been howling on the juke boxes for several