Edison Studios was an American

film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

production organization, owned by companies controlled by inventor and entrepreneur,

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February11, 1847October18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventions, ...

. The

studio A studio is a space set aside for creative work of any kind, including art, dance, music and theater. The word ''studio'' is derived from the , from , from ''studere'', meaning to study or zeal. Types Art The studio of any artist, esp ...

made close to 1,200 films, as part of the

Edison Manufacturing Company The Edison Manufacturing Company, originally registered as under the name of the United Edison Manufacturing Company and often known as simply the Edison Company, was organized by scientist / inventor and entrepreneur, Thomas A. Edison (1847–1 ...

(1894–1911) and then Thomas A. Edison, Inc. (1911–1918), until the studio's closing in 1918. Of that number, 54 were

feature length A feature film or feature-length film (often abbreviated to feature), also called a theatrical film, is a film ( motion picture, "movie" or simply “picture”) with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation ...

, and the remainder were shorts. All of the company's films have fallen into the public domain because they were released before 1928.

History

The first production facility was Edison's Black Maria studio, in

West Orange, New Jersey West Orange is a suburban Township (New Jersey), township in Essex County, New Jersey, Essex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the township's population was 48,843, an increase of 2,636 (+5.7%) from t ...

, built in the winter of 1892–93. The second facility, a glass-enclosed rooftop studio built at 41 East 21st Street in

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

's entertainment district, opened in 1901. In 1907, Edison had new facilities built, on Decatur Avenue and Oliver Place, in the Bedford Park neighborhood of

the Bronx The Bronx ( ) is the northernmost of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It shares a land border with Westchester County, New York, West ...

Thomas Edison himself played no direct part in the making of his studios' films, beyond being the owner and appointing William Gilmore as vice-president and general manager. Edison's assistant

William Kennedy Dickson William Kennedy Laurie Dickson (3 August 1860 – 28 September 1935) was a British- American inventor who devised an early motion picture camera under the employment of Thomas Edison. Early life William Kennedy Dickson was born on 3 Augu ...

, who supervised the development of Edison's motion picture system, produced the first Edison films intended for public exhibition, 1893–95. After Dickson's departure for the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company in 1895, he was replaced as director of production by cameraman William Heise, then from 1896 to 1903, by James H. White. When White left to supervise Edison's European interests in 1903, he was replaced by William Markgraf (1903–1904), then Alex T. Moore (1904–1909), and Horace G. Plimpton (1909–1915). The first commercially exhibited motion pictures in the United States were from Edison, and premiered at a

Kinetoscope The Kinetoscope is an early motion picture exhibition device, designed for films to be viewed by one person at a time through a peephole viewer window. The Kinetoscope was not a movie projector, but it introduced the basic approach that woul ...

parlor in New York City on April 14, 1894. The program consisted of ten short films, each less than a minute long, of athletes, dancers, and other performers. After competitors began exhibiting films on screens, Edison introduced its own, Projecting Kinetoscope, in late 1896. The earliest productions were brief "actualities", showing everything, from acrobats, to parades, to fire calls. But, competition from French and British story films, in the early 1900s, rapidly changed the market. By 1904, 85% of Edison's sales were from story films. In December 1908, Edison led the formation of the

Motion Picture Patents Company The Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC, also known as the Edison Trust), founded in December 1908 and effectively terminated in 1915 after it lost a United States v. Motion Picture Patents Co., federal antitrust suit, was a trust (19th century), ...

in an attempt to control the industry and shut out smaller producers. The "Edison Trust", as it was nicknamed, was made up of Edison, Biograph, Essanay Studios,

Kalem Company The Kalem Company was an early American film studio founded in New York City in 1907. It was one of the first companies to make films abroad and to set up winter production facilities, first in Florida and then in California. Kalem was sold to V ...

, George Kleine Productions,

Lubin Studios The Lubin Manufacturing Company was an American motion picture production company that produced silent films from 1896 to 1916. Lubin films were distributed with a Liberty Bell trademark. * * History The Lubin Manufacturing Company was forme ...

Georges Méliès Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès ( , ; 8 December 1861 – 21 January 1938) was a French magic (illusion), magician, toymaker, actor, and filmmaker. He led many technical and narrative developments in the early days of film, cinema, primarily in th ...

Pathé Pathé SAS (; styled as PATHÉ!) is a French major film production and distribution company, owning a number of cinema chains through its subsidiary Pathé Cinémas and television networks across Europe. It is the name of a network of Fren ...

Selig Studios The Selig Polyscope Company was an American motion picture company that was founded in 1896 by William Selig in Chicago, Illinois. The company produced hundreds of early, widely distributed commercial moving pictures, including the first films s ...

, and

Vitagraph Studios Vitagraph Studios, also known as the Vitagraph Company of America, was a United States motion picture studio. It was founded by J. Stuart Blackton and Albert E. Smith in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York, as the American Vitagraph Company. By 1907 ...

, and dominated distribution through the General Film Company. The Motion Picture Patents Co. and the General Film Co. were found guilty of

antitrust Competition law is the field of law that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies. Competition law is implemented through public and private enforcement. It is also known as antitrust l ...

violation in October 1915, and were dissolved. The breakup of the Trust by federal courts, under

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek and ) is a market in which one person or company is the only supplier of a particular good or service. A monopoly is characterized by a lack of economic Competition (economics), competition to produce ...

laws, and the loss of European markets during

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, hurt Edison financially. Edison sold its film business, including the Bronx studio, on 30 March 1918, to the Lincoln & Parker Film Company, of

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

Notable productions

Some of the studio's notable productions include '' The Kiss'' (1896); '' The Great Train Robbery'' (1903); ''

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (also known as ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English Children's literature, children's novel by Lewis Carroll, a mathematics university don, don at the University of Oxford. It details the story of a ...

'' (1910); ''

Frankenstein ''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 Gothic novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a Sapience, sapient Frankenstein's monster, crea ...

'' (1910), the first film adaptation of the novel; '' The Battle of Trafalgar'' (1911); '' What Happened to Mary'' (1912), one of the earliest film serials; and '' The Land Beyond the Sunset'' (1912), which was directed by Harold M. Shaw and was later described by film historian William K. Everson as "'the screen's first genuinely lyrical film'". The company also produced a number of short " Kinetophone" sound films in 1913–1914 using a sophisticated acoustical recording system capable of picking up sound from 30 feet away. They released a number of

Raoul Barré Vital Achille Raoul Barré (January 29, 1874 – May 21, 1932) was a Canadian cartoonist, animator of the silent film era, and painter. Initially known as a political cartoonist, he originated the French Canadian comic strip, then crossed over in ...

cartoon films in 1915 and the first film version of the

Robert Louis Stevenson Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as ''Treasure Island'', ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll ...

historical novel '' Kidnapped''. However, Edison Studios got destroyed.

Legacy

Everson, calling Edison Studios "financially successful and artistically unambitious," wrote that other than directors Edwin S. Porter and John Hancock Collins,

e Edison studios never turned out a notable director, or even one above average. Nor did the Edison films show the sense of dynamic progress, that one gets, from studying the Biograph films, on a year-by-year basis. On the contrary, there is a sense of stagnation.

However, new restorations and screenings of Edison films in recent years contradict Everson's statement; indeed, Everson citing '' The Land Beyond the Sunset'' points out creativity at Edison beyond Porter and Collins, as it was directed by Harold M. Shaw (1877–1926), who later went on to a successful career directing in England, South Africa, and Lithuania before returning to the US in 1922. Other important directors who started at Edison included Oscar Apfel,

Charles Brabin Charles Brabin (April 17, 1882 – November 3, 1957) was a British-American film director. Biography Born in Liverpool, England, he was educated at St. Francis Xavier's College (Liverpool), St. Francis Xavier College. Brabin sailed to New Yor ...

Alan Crosland Frederick Alan Crosland (August 10, 1894 – July 16, 1936) was an American stage actor and film director. He is noted for having directed the first feature film using spoken dialogue, ''The Jazz Singer'' (1927) and the first feature movie with s ...

, J. Searle Dawley, and

Edward H. Griffith Edward H. Griffith (August 23, 1888 – March 3, 1975) (also known as E H Griffith, Lieut. Edward H. Griffith, Edward Griffith, and E. H. Griffith) was an American film director, motion picture director, screenwriter, and producer. Biography ...

Notable films

File:Blacksmith Scene.ogv, '' Blacksmith Scene'' (1893) File:Fred Ott's Sneeze (1894).webm, ''Fred Ott's Sneeze'' (1894) File:Annie Oakley shooting glass balls, 1894.ogv, Annie Oakley shooting glass balls, 1894 File:Leonard-Cushing fight (1894).webm, '' Leonard-Cushing fight'' (1894), the first

boxing match Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing punches at each other for a p ...

on film. File:The Kiss (1896).webm, '' The Kiss'' (1896), the first love scene on film. File:Whathappenedontwentythirdstreet-thomasedisoninc.ogv, ''What Happened on Twenty-third Street in New York Cty'' (1901) File:The Great Train Robbery (1903) - yt.webm, '' The Great Train Robbery'' (1903), the first "

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

" ever filmed. File:The messenger boy's mistake (1903).webm, ''The Messenger Boys Mistake'' (1903) File:Nervy Nat Kisses the Bride (1904) - yt.webm, ''Nervy Nat Kisses the Bride'' (1904) File:Battle of Chemulpo Bay edison.ogv, alt=A film of a re-enactment of a naval battle, depicting Russians firing at a Japanese ship with a cannon., ''Battle of Chemulpo Bay'' (1904), a re-enactment of the '' Battle of Chemulpo Bay''. File:The Night Before Christmas (1905).webm, ''

The Night Before Christmas "A Visit from St. Nicholas", routinely referred to as "The Night Before Christmas" and "Twas the Night Before Christmas" from its first line, is a poem first published anonymously under the title "Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas" in 1823. A ...

'' (1905), an early film adaptation of the 1823 poem, " A Visit from St. Nicholas". File:Frankenstein1910-clip.ogv, thumbtime=49, The climax of ''

'' (1910), the first film adaptation of the 1818 novel ''

''.

References

External links

* * *
''EdisonStudios.net''
(includes a viewable Edison Studios 1910 adaptation of "Frankenstein")
Vernon K. Flaherty and R. Brian Flaherty collection (R9144)
at

Library and Archives Canada Library and Archives Canada (LAC; ) is the federal institution tasked with acquiring, preserving, and providing accessibility to the documentary heritage of Canada. The national archive and library is the 16th largest library in the world. T ...