First public demonstration of the Kinetoscope - May 9, 1893

On this day in 1893, the Kinetoscope had its first public demonstration at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. Hi, I'm Eves, and Welcome to This Day
in History Class, a show that uncovers history one day
at a time. Today is May nine. The day was

(00:24):
May nine. The first public demonstration of the kinetoscope was
held at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences. The
kinetoscope was an early motion picture device in which people
viewed images through a people at the top. By the
end of the nineteenth century, the concept of movie images

(00:44):
had permeated the tech world. The zoo practice scope, invented
by photographer Edward Muybridge, showed a sequence of still photographs
in successive phases of movement. Multiple cameras were used to
record these images. Inspired by the development of motion picture
devices and a visit to moy Bridges lab, inventor Thomas

(01:05):
Edison decided to design a device of his own that
could record successive images in a single camera and reproduce
objects in motion. In eighteen ninety, Thomas Edison commissioned William
Dixon to build the first modern motion picture camera. The
camera was called the Kinetograph. The kinetograph was a motion

(01:26):
picture camera that used celluloid film that was fed through
the camera with a system of sprockets. The next year,
Edison and Dickson developed the Kinetoscope, a single viewer peep
show device where film was moved past a light. A
prototype of the device was shown to a convention of
the National Federation of Women's Clubs in May of eighteen

(01:47):
ninety one. The Kinetoscope was completed by eighteen ninety two,
and in eighteen nine three Edison completed construction of the
first motion picture production studio in West Orange, New Jersey.
The single room production center was nicknamed the Black Maria,
and it cost a little more than six dollars to construct,

(02:07):
which would be about sixteen thousand bucks today. The Kinetoscope
was supposed to premiere at the Chicago World's Fair in
eighteen nine three, but it did not have his big
opening on May one at the exposition as planned because
of production delays and a nervous breakdown Dixon Head. Historians
debate whether a kinetoscope was actually on display at the

(02:29):
fair at all, but on May ninth, viewers lined up
after a lecture at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and
Sciences to see two films on the Kinetoscope. One was
called Blacksmithing Scene, a film that Edison created in his
New Jersey studio in late April of eight It was
the first film of more than a few feet to
be publicly exhibited, and it included the first instance of

(02:52):
screen acting, since the film's subjects were not actually blacksmiths.
Blacksmithing Scene is also one of the earliest survived and
complete motion pictures on film. The other film that was shown,
one about horse shoeing, is now lost. An article in
the July issue of the Alton Telegraph out of Illinois

(03:13):
set the following about blacksmithing scene. The scene represented three
men in a forge hammering a piece of red hot iron.
The picture was so perfect in action, perspective, and proportion
that it was exactly the same as if the scene
was witnessed through a camera obscura. Every action of the
men was shown. One suddenly threw down his hammer and

(03:35):
motioned toward a bottle of lager beer on the ground.
This was handed to him by one of the other men.
He lifted it to his mouth and took a long drink,
and after handing it to the second man, spat on
his hands and grabbed his hammer, beginning to pound the
iron on the anvil with renewed strength. The smoke from
the forge rose steadily into the air and curves and circles,
and the sparks from the anvil flew in all directions.

(03:58):
In Ennoscope parlors opened around the world, and by Edison
had introduced the Kineta phone, which combined the kinetoscope with
the phonograph to have found accompany the motion picture. But
soon the popularity of the kinetoscope faded as projectors were
developed for motion pictures. The Lumire Brothers created the Cinematograph,

(04:20):
a motion picture film camera that was also a film
projector and printer. It had his first demonstration and I'm
Eve Stephcote and hopefully you know a little more about
history today than you did yesterday. If there's something that
I missed in an episode, you can share it with
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(04:43):
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