Biographet Projector (head only) (American Mutoscope & Biograph Co.)
date: label: date made
content: 1898-05-10
notes: label: Description (Brief)
content: This is a Biographet 35mm Motion Picture Projector head. It is a metal apparatus composed of a revolving shutter inside solid vertical casing in front of a film gate with a wood friction wheel. A brass crank is attached to operate the shutter via a system of gears. A stand above the gears was used to hold the film reel being run through the machine. The vertical casing bears a plaque which reads "Trade Mark Biographet / Patented May 10, 98 / Other Patents Pending / No. 6 / American Mutoscope and Biograph Co. / New York / U.S.A."
label: Description
content: The PHC’s Early Sound Cinema Collection [COLL.PHOTOS.000040] includes the unit’s holdings of apparatus, film and other media related to the history of matching recorded sound to projected motion pictures. The collection includes over 50 pieces of apparatus related to Eugene Augustin Lauste’s experiments with sound-on-film technology. Lauste, a pioneering motion picture engineer, used selenium cells to record playable soundtracks alongside images on film in the first two decades of the twentieth century. Lauste failed to find commercial success with his inventions, and Bell Laboratories bought the rights to Lauste’s work and collections for patent litigation use before donating the materials to the Smithsonian in the 1930s. The collection also includes several pieces of apparatus used to record and project motion pictures with sound before the process became an industry standard, two short lengths of film used to demonstrate early processes and a film of a lecture on the history of sound experiments from 1922.
label: Description
content: This collection is one in a series documenting the PHC’s Early Cinema Collection [COLL.PHOTOS.000018]. The cinema-related objects cover the range of technological innovation and popular appeal that defined the motion picture industry during a period in which it became the premier form of mass communication in American life, roughly 1885-1930. See also finding aids for Early Cinema Equipment [COLL.PHOTOS.000037], Early Color Cinema [COLL.PHOTOS.000039], Early Cinema Film and Ephemera [COLL.PHOTOS.000038], and the Gatewood Dunston Collection [COLL.PHOTOS.000021].
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: New York, New York City
topic: label: Subject
content: Motion Pictures
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Photographic History
label: See more items in
content: Photography
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Bell Telephone Laboratories
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PG.4046.36
label: accession number
content: 129430
label: catalog number
content: 4046.36
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Biographet
label: Object Name
content: motion picture projector
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: manufactured (overall production method/technique)
label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 16 in x 11 in x 6 in; 40.64 cm x 27.94 cm x 15.24 cm