Edisonia Hall was a generic name for exhibition halls that displayed the various inventions of

Thomas Alva Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847October 18, 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 invention ...

's company. These included the

phonograph A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...

, the

Vitascope Vitascope was an early film projector first demonstrated in 1895 by Charles Francis Jenkins and Thomas Armat. They had made modifications to Jenkins' patented Phantoscope, which cast images via film and electric light onto a wall or screen. The Vi ...

, the

Kinetoscope The Kinetoscope is an precursors of film, 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 ...

and other such devices. The Edisonia Hall opened by

Mitchell Mark Mitchel H. Mark a.k.a. Mitchell Mark a.k.a. Mitchell H. Mark (born as Mitchel Henry Mark) (1868 – March 20, 1918) was a pioneer of motion picture exhibition in the United States. Early life Mitchel Henry Mark was born in 1868 in Richmond Virgi ...

and Moe Mark in

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York (behind only New York City) and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from South ...

in the

Ellicott Square Building The Ellicott Square Building is a historic office complex, completed in 1896, located in Buffalo, New York. It is found within the Joseph Ellicott Historic District. History The Ellicott Square Building was designed by Charles Atwood of D. H. ...

on October 19, 1896, had the distinction of hosting a Vitascope Theater (or "Theatre"). This was the first known dedicated, purpose-built motion picture theater in the world. The theater was referred to in newspapers of the day ('' Buffalo Express'', ''

Buffalo News ''The Buffalo News'' is the daily newspaper of the Buffalo–Niagara Falls metropolitan area, located in downtown Buffalo, New York. It recently sold its headquarters to Uniland Development Corp. It was for decades the only paper fully owned by W ...

'', and others) as Vitascope Theater, Vitascope Hall, and the Electrical Theater. The majority of the first program of films were Lumiere Films obtained through Pathe Freres. In its first year of existence, more than 200,000 people visited to view motion pictures projected on a screen. The theater remained open for nearly two years, longer than any other early motion picture theater known. On November 25, 2007, the

published an article by Mark Sommer confirming the historical significance of this theater.Sommer, 2007

References

Notes Sources * ''Buffalo Express'' 1886-10-19. * Ramsaye, Terry
''A Million and One Nights: A History of the Motion Picture''
(Abingdon, UK: Frank Cass, 2012) riginal edition: New York: Simon and Schuster, 1926* Sandhu, Ranjit. ''History of Buffalo Theaters''; unpublished manuscript, collection Buffalo and Erie County Public Library, Grosvenor Room. * Sommer, Mark
"Another groundbreaker for Buffalo: The nation's first motion picture theater may have been in Ellicott Square"
''Buffalo YNews'' 2007-11-25. * Sommer, Mark
"Scholars say movie theater debuted here"
''Buffalo YNews'' 2008-10-19.

External links

Cinema Treasures Historic Listing
''Buffalo Architecture and History'' website. Extensive references and photos. {{coord missing, Western NY Tourist attractions in Buffalo, New York Cinemas and movie theaters in New York (state) Former cinemas in the United States