Edison Studios

Three men hammer on an anvil and pass a bottle of beer around. Notable for being the first film in which a scene is being acted out.

William K.L. Dickson brings his hat from his one hand to the other and moves his head slightly, as a small nod toward the audience. This was the first film produced by the Edison Manufacturing Company to be shown to public audiences and the press.

Experimental film made to test the original cylinder format of the Kinetoscope and believed to be the first film shot in the United States. It shows a blurry figure in white standing in one place making large gestures and is only a few seconds long.

A short film depicting the execution of Mary, Queen of the Scots. Mary is brought to the execution block and made to kneel down with her neck over it. The executioner lifts his axe ready to bring it down. After that frame Mary has been replaced by a dummy. The axe comes down and severs the head of the dummy from the body. The executioner picks up the head and shows it around for everyone else to see. One of the first camera tricks to be used in a movie.

Frankenstein, a young medical student, trying to create the perfect human being, instead creates a misshapen monster. Made ill by what he has done, Frankenstein is comforted by his fiancée; but on his wedding night he is visited by the monster.

After the train station clerk is assaulted and left bound and gagged, then the departing train and its passengers robbed, a posse goes in hot pursuit of the fleeing bandits.

The first woman to appear in front of an Edison motion picture camera and possibly the first woman to appear in a motion picture within the United States. In the film, Carmencita is recorded going through a routine she had been performing at Koster & Bial's in New York since February 1890.

Experimental film fragment made with the Edison-Dickson-Heise experimental horizontal-feed kinetograph camera and viewer, using 3/4-inch wide film.

Experimental film fragment made with the Edison-Dickson-Heise experimental horizontal-feed kinetograph camera and viewer, using 3/4-inch wide film.

William K.L. Dickson plays the violin while two men dance. This is the oldest surviving sound film where sound is recorded on the phonograph.

An early Thomas Edison short. A young woman is kidnapped while attending a play in Chinatown. A reporter attends another play in Chinatown, is likewise kidnapped and rescues the young woman. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2011 in partnership with the National Film Preservation Foundation New Zealand Project.

Experimental film that follows up on the results of "Monkeyshines, No. 1". Once again, an Edison company worker moves around in front of the motion picture camera.

Annabelle (Whitford) Moore performs one of her popular dances. For this performance, her costume has a pair of wings attached to her back, to suggest a butterfly. As she dances, she uses her long, flowing skirts to create visual patterns.

A man (Thomas Edison's assistant) takes a pinch of snuff and sneezes. This is one of the earliest Thomas Edison films and was the second motion picture to be copyrighted in the United States.

Long before Hollywood started painting white men red and dressing them as 'Injuns' Edison's company was using the genuine article! Featuring for what is believed to be the Native Americans first appearance before a motion picture camera 'Buffalo Dance' features genuine members of the Sioux Tribe dressed in full war paint and costume! The dancers are believed to be veteran members of Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. Filmed again at the Black Maria studios by both Dickson and Heise the 'Buffalo Dance' warriors were named as Hair Coat, Parts His Hair and Last Horse. Its quite strange seeing these movies at first they all stand around waiting to begin and as they start some of the dancers look at the camera in an almost sad way at having lost their way of life.

In a long, diaphanous skirt, held out by her hands with arms extended, Broadway dancer Annabelle Moore performs. Her dance emphasizes the movement of the flowing cloth. She moves to her right and left across an unadorned stage. Many of the prints were distributed in hand-tinted color.

Eugen Sandow, who claims to be the strongest man in the world, appears in the Edison Company's film studio.

A live-action film adaptation of the comic strip Dream of the Rarebit Fiend by American cartoonist Winsor McCay. This silent short film follows the established theme: the “Rarebit Fiend” gorges himself on rarebit and thus suffers spectacular hallucinatory dreams.

When a burglar dressed as Santa Claus steals a family's Christmas presents, amateur detective Octavius sets out to recover the loot.

Early Edison short showing two men fencing.