''Fred Ott's Sneeze'' (also known as ''Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze'') is an 1894
short,
black-and-white
Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white to produce a range of achromatic brightnesses of grey. It is also known as greyscale in technical settings.
Media
The history of various visual media began with black and white, ...
silent film
A silent film is a film without synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, w ...
shot by
William K.L. Dickson and featuring
Fred Ott. According to the Library of Congress, it is the second oldest surviving U.S.
motion picture
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, since ...
to be copyrighted, although it is now in the public domain.
In the approximately five-second film, which was shot in January 1894, one of
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, ...
's assistants,
Fred Ott, takes a pinch of
snuff and sneezes. According to the Library of Congress, the film was "made for publicity purposes, as a series of still photographs to accompany an article in ''
Harper's Weekly
''Harper's Weekly, A Journal of Civilization'' was an American political magazine based in New York City. Published by Harper (publisher), Harper & Brothers from 1857 until 1916, it featured foreign and domestic news, fiction, essays on many su ...
''."
The published ''
Harper's Weekly
''Harper's Weekly, A Journal of Civilization'' was an American political magazine based in New York City. Published by Harper (publisher), Harper & Brothers from 1857 until 1916, it featured foreign and domestic news, fiction, essays on many su ...
'' version is slightly longer than what now survives on film, and depicts a second sneeze.
In 2015, the United States
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...
selected the film for preservation in the
National Film Registry
The National Film Registry (NFR) is the United States National Film Preservation Board's (NFPB) collection of films selected for preservation (library and archival science), preservation, each selected for its cultural, historical, and aestheti ...
, finding it "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."
Production
The film was produced by 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 ...
, which had begun making films in
1890
Events
January
* January 1 – The Kingdom of Italy establishes Eritrea as its colony in the Horn of Africa.
* January 2 – Alice Sanger becomes the first female staffer in the White House.
* January 11 – 1890 British Ultimatum: The Uni ...
under the direction of Dickson, one of the earliest film pioneers. It was filmed within the
Black Maria
Black Maria may refer to:
Art and literature
*Black Mariah (comics), a character in the Luke Cage comics series
*List of One Piece characters#Animal Kingdom Pirates, Black Maria, a character in the manga series ''One Piece''
*Black Maria (nove ...
studio at
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 ...
, which was the first U.S. movie studio. It was filmed between January 2, 1894, and January 7, 1894
and was displayed, at the time, on
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 ...
.
Current status
As a film
published in the United States before 1978 and more than 95 years ago, its
copyright
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, ...
expired and the work is in the
public domain
The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...
in the United States. In countries where copyright expires
70 years after the author's death, the copyright of the film expired in 2006. Originally, the film was submitted to the
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...
as a "paper print" (a photographic record of each frame of the film) for copyright purposes. A digital copy is now kept by the Library of Congress and can be viewed on their
American Memory
American Memory is an Internet-based archive for public domain image resources, audio, video, and archived Web content. Published by the Library of Congress, the archive launched on October 13, 1994, after $13 million was raised in private donati ...
website.
This short film was featured at the
30th Annual Academy Awards, and was included as part of the TV documentary, ''The First 100 Years: A Celebration of American Movies''.
See also
*
1894 in film
*
Sneeze
A sneeze (also known as sternutation) is a semi-autonomous, convulsive expulsion of air from the lungs through the nose and mouth, usually caused by foreign particles irritating the nasal mucosa. A sneeze expels air forcibly from the mouth a ...
*''
The Horse in Motion
''The Horse in Motion'' is a series of cabinet cards by Eadweard Muybridge, including six cards that each show a series of six to twelve "automatic electro-photographs" depicting successive phases in the movement of a horse, shot in June 187 ...
''
References
External links
Library of CongressLibrary of CongressVideo of ''Fred Ott's Sneeze''at
Archive
An archive is an accumulation of historical records or materials, in any medium, or the physical facility in which they are located.
Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual or organ ...
Video of ''Fred Ott's Sneeze''on
YouTube
YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fred Otts Sneeze
1894 films
1894 short films
1890s American films
American short documentary films
American black-and-white films
American silent short films
Articles containing video clips
Thomas Edison
Films directed by William Kennedy Dickson
Films shot in New Jersey
1890s short documentary films
Black-and-white documentary films
United States National Film Registry films
Edison Manufacturing Company films
Sneeze
Surviving American silent films