Having already astounded the world by reproducing sound with his Phonograph, Thomas Edison set his sights on representing continuous movement by means of photography. Following an inspirational meeting with the chronophotographer Eadweard Muybridge in 1888, Edison drew up preliminary designs for a motion picture viewer to be named the “Kinetoscope”. His principal assistant W. K. L. Dickson was soon enlisted to develop both the viewing device and a supplying camera (the “Kinetograph”), a task that was made easier when George Eastman began to produce thin celluloid film for use in his “Kodak” still cameras in 1889. By 1892–93 Dickson was experimenting with long lengths of celluloid cut by the Eastman Company to a width of 1½ in (38.1mm), which was slightly trimmed at the Edison works. Although Dickson was more concerned with the dimensions of the viewable image, i.e., 1 in (25.4mm) by ¾ in (19.05mm), the film-gauge measurement of 34.93mm – approximating to 35mm – was to set the industry standard for many years into the future. When faced with the possibility of different frame dimensions, Dickson elected to employ a rectangular image. The blueprint for modern film was completed when Edison, after considering various alternatives, chose to transport the film through the camera and viewer by using four sprocket holes per frame, along each side of the film.

A studio, the “Black Maria”, was constructed with an opening roof that could be oriented to make full use of available sunlight. Tied to the studio by the heavy Kinetograph camera, subjects were usually around half-a-minute long and often featured variety acts, comic skits, or athletic episodes. Although the possibility of projection had been widely discussed, Edison elected to present his films in the Kinetoscope viewer, a peepshow device that owed its rationale to coin-operated Phonographs. A prototype was first publicly exhibited at Edison’s laboratory on 20 May 1891, with a redesigned device being demonstrated at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences on May 9, 1893. In readiness for public exhibition, film production was stepped up, with Dickson and William Heise filming around 75 subjects during 1894 (Musser, 1994: pp. 87–166). The Edison Manufacturing Company assumed responsibility for producing motion pictures and hardware, whilst marketing was in the hands of the Kinetoscope Company, a consortium that included Alfred O. Tate (Edison’s former business manager), Norman C. Raff, Frank R. Gammon, and the Canadian entrepreneur Andrew M. Holland. Along with his brother George, Holland became the Kinetoscope’s first commercial exhibitor, opening a ten-machine parlor at 1155 Broadway, New York, on April 14, 1894.

By the end of the year, the Continental Commerce Company acquired the rights to promote Edison’s Kinetoscope outside the United States and Canada, but not before devices purchased earlier had already been exhibited in Europe. Greek-American entrepreneurs George A. Georgiades, Demetrius Georgiades, George John Tragidis and George Malamakis purchased several Kinetoscopes and brought at least one of them to Paris where they opened an exhibition in June 1894. While continuing with the French business, they opened a London parlor in competiton with the Continental Commerce Company, whose public exhibitions had commenced at 70 Oxford Street on October 18, 1894. Despite the Continental Commerce Company’s efforts to control the sale and distribution of Kinetoscopes, the high purchase price of their proprietary machines quickly led to lower-priced copies appearing on the market. Within a few months the company’s attempts to restrict the sale of Edison-made films to purchasers of their own machines resulted in the independent Kinetoscope manufacturer Robert W. Paul collaborating with Birt Acres to create Britain’s first practical movie camera.

The popularity of the Kinetoscope was beginning to recede in North America and Europe by the time exhibitors were trying their luck in other parts of the world. Five machines were sent from London to Australia where they gave the first public show on 30 November 1894. The first exhibitions were given in South Africa in April 1895, while the Kinetoscope did not reach India until the winter of 1895/96. The first show in Japan occurred as late as 17 November 1896.

The “Wizard” Edison contrived to pull the financial rug from beneath his own feet by arousing public interest with colourful predictions of projected film while continuing to offer the distinctly small-scale viewing experience of the Kinetoscope peepshow. As 1895 progressed, the device’s failing novelty value, combined with high running costs, brought about a steady commercial decline. The writing, or rather the picture, was on the wall for the Kinetoscope as early as May 1895 when the Latham family (with covert assistance of W. K. L. Dickson) first publicly exhibited their Eidoloscope projector in New York. Edison finally bowed to the inevitable by launching the Vitascope projector (invented by Charles Francis Jenkins and Thomas Armat) in April 1896, but not until several other devices had been successfully exhibited in Europe and the United States. Unlike the manually operated Mutoscope viewer with its paper prints which remained a source of entertainment for many years, the electrically driven Kinetoscope was soon abandoned. Edison’s bookkeeper, John Randolph, testified that by December 8, 1899, 973 Edison Kinetoscopes had been manufactured, a figure which may eventually have exceeded 1,000. Of these, Ray Phillips has estimated that only nine Kinetoscopes and three Kinetophones survive (Phillips, 1997: p. 98). Although not entirely suitable, Edison-made Kinetoscope films often featured in early projected film exhibitions. About 135 to 150 Edison Kinetoscope films were made in the United States, with a smaller number filmed in the United Kingdom and Germany by Birt Acres.