selling kinetoscopes for $300 to $350 and making a profit. They said that if they sold machines around the country, people could see films simultaneously in large groups. Edison thought that there would be use for about ten kinetoscopes. On top of that, another company created a motion picture machine they called the pantopticon. Which was first displayed in public on May 20th, 1895, in New York City. At the same time a man name Thomas Armat was creating a stop-motion device for the two machines. Edison was informed of Armat’s invention and in early 1896 the two men reached an agreement to manufacture a projection machine incorporating both devices. The machine was marketed under Edison’s name but was labeled “Armat design” Together they chose the new name for their machine. The vitascope.On April 14, 1896, under the headline “Edison’s Latest Triumph,” the New York Times reported:“Thomas A. Edison and Albert Bial have perfected arrangements by which Edison’s latest invention, the vitascope, will be exhibited for the first time anywhere at Koster & Bial’s Music Hall. Edison has been working on the vitascope for several years.The vitascope projects upon a large area of canvas groups that appear to stand forth from the canvas, and move with great agility and facility, as though actuated by separate impulses. In this way the bare canvas before the audience becomes instantly a stage upon which living beings move about.Mr. Bial said yesterday: “I propose to reproduce in this way at Koster & Bial’s scenes from various succesful plays and operas of the season, and well-known statesmen and celebrities will be represented as, for instance, making a speech or performing some important act or series of acts with which their names are identified. No other manager in this city will have the right to exhibit the vitascope.Edison was delighted about the new machine and ...
