RESOURCES
This section covers a wide range of resources for readers to take further their interest in Victorian cinema, or Victorian life as reflected through the projected image. Follow the links on the left-hand menu for individual sections.
CHRONOLOGY
Below is a chronology of events for the late Victorian period, both general historical events and milestones in the development of motion pictures. The chronology begins withEadweard Muybridge's first attempts at photographing motion and ends with the death ofQueen Victoria. For fuller chronologies of the birth of cinema, see Stephen Herbert,When the Movies Began... (1994) and Deac Rossell,The New Thing with the Long Name and the Old Thing with the Name That Isn't Much Shorter (1995).
| Victorian cinema | Victorian era |
| 1871 | 1871 Jan - Germany unified under Kaiser Wilhelm I; Bismarck becomes Chancellor Mar - France is defeated in the Franco-Prussian War May - Paris Commune crushed |
| 1872 May -Eadweard Muybridge photographs Leland Stanford's horse Occident | 1872 Nov - First international Association Football match England v Scotland The first picture postcard is produced |
| 1873 Apr -Muybridge manages to photograph Occident showing all four legs off the ground at once E-J. Marey publishesLa machine animale | 1873 Sep - Financial 'Panic' in USA Leo Tolstoy'sAnna Karenina Jules Verne'sAround the World in Eighty Days |
| 1874 Dec -Jules Janssen uses an 'astronomical revolver' to photograph the transit of the planet Venus | 1874 Feb - Conservative election victory in Britain, Benjamin Disraeli becomes prime minister Edison invents the quadruplex telegraph First Impressionist exhibition held in Paris Verdi'sRequiem performed |
| 1875 | 1875 Edison invents the Mimeograph duplicating process Aug - Captain Matthew Webb swims the English Channel Bizet's operaCarmen |
| 1876 | 1876 Mar - Turkish massacre of Bulgarians causes international outcry Mar - Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone Jun - Sioux annihilate Custer's cavalry at Battle of Little Big Horn National Baseball league founded in USA Mark Twain publishesThe Adventures of Tom Sawyer |
| 1877 Jul -Eadweard Muybridge resumes action photography experiments for Leland Stanford and produces a photograph of Occident galloping at full speed Dec -Emile Reynaud patents thePraxinoscope | 1877 Jan -Queen Victoria proclaimed Empress of India Mar - Republican Rutherford Hayes becomes US president Apr - Britain annexes the Transvaal May - Russia declares war on Turkey May - Porfirio Diaz becomes president of Mexico Dec -Thomas Edison invents the Phonograph First All-England Lawn Tennis championships at Wimbledon |
| 1878 Jun -Muybridge sets up a camera shed at Palo Alto for photographing horses in sequence Dec -E-J. Marey reads aboutMuybridge's sequence photography inLa Nature and writes to him, asking him to photograph birds in flight | 1878 Jun-Jul - Treaty of Berlin to settle 'Eastern question' Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake William Booth founds the Salvation Army |
| 1879 Feb -W.K-L. Dickson writes toThomas Edison asking for a job (unsuccessfully) Aug -Muybridge begins photographing humans in motion Muybridge demonstrates his Zoogyroscope (later theZoopraxiscope) | 1879 Jan-Jul - British-Zulu war Oct - Britain invades Afghanistan Nov -Edison patents his electric light bulb War of the Pacific, Chile against Peru and Bolivia Henrik Ibsen'sA Doll's House |
| 1880 May - First public exhibitions of theZoopraxiscope | 1880 Apr - Liberal election victory, William Gladstone become prime minister Oct - Transvaal declares independence from Britain First street lighting in New York First cricket Test match, between England and Australia |
| 1881 Sep -Muybridge gives the first European demonstration of theZoopraxiscope and meetsE-J. Marey | 1881 Feb - Boers defeat British at Majuba Mar - Republican James Garfield becomes US president Apr - Britain recognises Transvaal independence Jul - President Garfield assassinated, replaced by Chester Arthur |
| 1882 Le Station Physiologique opens, headed byE-J. Marey withGeorges Demenÿ as his assistant E-J. Marey's photographic gun used to photograph the flight of birds Albert Londe constructs a nine-lens camera for medical chronophotography | 1882 May - Phoenix Park murders in Dublin May - Italy joins Austro-German alliance (Triple Alliance) Society for Psychical Research founded |
| 1883 Apr -W.K-L. Dickson begins working forEdison | 1883 Apr - Paul Kruger becomes president of the Transvaal Nov - Britain evacuates the Sudan First skyscraper built in Chicago |
| 1884 | 1884 Nov - Berlin Conference sparks off the 'Scramble for Africa' Mark Twain'sThe Adventures of Huckleberry Finn |
| 1885 Oct -Ottomar Anschütz begins sequence photography at Hanover cavalry school George Eastman perfects process for manufacturing coated photographic paper | 1885 Jan - Madhi captures Khartoum and General Gordon killed Mar - Democrat Grover Cleveland inauguarated US president Jun - Gladstone resigns, Lord Salisbury forms Conservative administration The Indian National Congress meets for the first time Louis Pasteur introduces innoculation against rabies Work begins in Britain onDictionary of National Biography Gilbert and Sullivan'sThe Mikado Karl Benz builds the first successful petrol-driven motor car, in Mannheim, Germany |
| 1886 Nov -Louis Le Prince files a patent for a sixteen lens motion picture camera | 1886 Jan - Salisbury resigns, Gladstone becomes Liberal prime minister once more Apr - Liberals introduce Irish Home Rule Bill Jun - Liberals defeated over Home Rule Bill Aug - Conservatives win British general election under Lord Salisbury |
| 1887 Ottomar Anschütz devises theElectro-Tachyscope Eadweard Muybridge publishesAnimal Locomotion | 1887 Jun -Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee Arthur Conan Doyle publishes the first Sherlock Holmes story,A Study in Scarlet Zamenhof invents Esperanto as an international language |
| 1888 Jan -Le Prince patents a single lens motion picture camera Feb -Thomas Edison seesMuybridge'sZoopraxiscope Oct -Edison writes his first motion picture caveat, stating that he will produce 'an instrument which does for the Eye what the phonograph does for the Ear'. He puts the task to his assistantW.K-L. Dickson Oct -Le Prince takes paper negatives of scenes in his father-in-law's garden in Leeds, and traffic crossing Leeds bridge George Eastman introduces the 'Kodak' box camera | 1888 Mar - Karl Benz begins selling petrol-driven motor cars Nov - Republican Benjamin Harrison wins US presidential election First beauty contest held at Spa, Belgium |
| 1889 Jan -Emile Reynaud patents hisThéâtre Optique Jan 22 -William Friese Greene and Mortimer Evans patent a camera which takes four or five pictures per second Feb -Eastman begins production of celluloid roll film Aug -Thomas Edison visitsE-J. Marey at Le Station Physiologique | 1889 Jan - General Boulanger's attemptedcoup d'état in France fails Jan - Crown Prince Archduke Rudolf of Austria commits suicide at Mayerling Nov - Brazil declared a republic Paris Exposition, for which the Eiffel Tower is built |
| 1890 Jan 18 -AnschützElectrotachyscope demonstrated at Photographic Association, Berlin Mar 10 -William Friese-Greene writes toThomas Edison about his motion picture work Sep -Louis Le Prince disappears Nov - Earliest surviving examples ofEdison/Dickson's motion picture experiments Nov 3 -E-J. Marey demonstrates sequence camera for the Académie des Sciences, Paris Wordsworth Donisthorpe and W.C. Crofts film Trafalgar Square | 1890 Mar - Bismarck dismissed as German chancellor Jul - first general election in Japan Aug - William Kemmler is the first person to be executed by electric chair, at Auburn Museum, NY |
| 1891 May 16 -AnschützElectrical Schnellseher opens at International Electrotechnical Exhibition in Frankfurt am Main May 20 - EdisonKinetoscope demonstrated to National Federation of Women's Clubs Jul 27 -Georges Demenÿ demonstrates thePhonoscope before the Académie des Sciences in Paris | 1891 Sep - General Boulanger commits suicide Thomas Hardy'sTess of the D'Urbevilles Oscar Wilde'sThe Portrait of Dorian Gray |
| 1892 Feb 12 -Léon-Guillaume Bouly patents a sequence camera and calls it a Cinématographe Oct -W.K-L. Dickson comes up with vertically-fed 35 mm celluloid film with double row of perforations, the basis of successful cinematography Oct 28 -Emile Reynaud opens hisPantomimes lumineuses at theThéâtre Optique, Paris | 1892 Jul - Liberals win British general election, Gladstone premier again Nov - Democrat Grover Cleveland wins US presidential election Nov - Panama Canal scandal in France C.F. Cross and E.J. Bevan create the first artifical fibre, rayon, out of cellulose Rudyard Kipling'sBarrack Room Ballads |
| 1893 Feb -Edison's Black Maria studio fully fitted at West Orange, New Jersey May 9 -Kinetoscope production model demonstrated at Brooklyn Institute | 1893 Karl Benz introduces the four-wheeled car Chicago World's Fair New Zealand becomes the first country to give women the vote |
| 1894 Jan 9 - First film deposited for copyright at the Library of Congress,Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze, featuringFred Ott Mar 6 -Eugen Sandow filmed for theKinetoscope at the Black Maria studio Apr 14 - FirstKinetoscope parlour opened by theHolland brothers at 1155 Broadway, New York Oct 1 -Kinetoscope first exhibited to the public in France at 20 boulevard Montmartre Oct 17 - preview ofKinetoscope parlour managed byMaguire and Baucus at 70 Oxford Street, London, opens to public next day Nov 30 -Kinetoscope parlour opens at 148 Pitt Street, Sydney, Australia | 1894 Mar - Gladstone resigns and Lord Rosebery becomes Liberal prime minister Oct -Alfred Dreyfus arrested on charges of treason Nov -Nikolas II becomes Tsar of Russia Guglielmo Marconi sends his first radio message |
| 1895 Feb - Around this dateBirt Acres takes a film outside his Barnet home, withPaul camera Mar 22 - LumièreCinématographe shown to the Société d'Encouragement à l'Industrie Nationale, 44 rue de Rennes, Paris - a single film is shown,Sortie d'usine Apr 21 - TheLathams'Panoptikon projector demonstrated to the press at 35 Frankfort Street, New York May 20 - Eidoloscope (the renamedPanoptikon) opens to paying public at 153 Broadway, New York Jun 10 - LumièreCinématographe presented to Congrèes des Sociétés Françaises de Photographie, Lyons Sep -Jenkins-Armat projectors demonstrated at Cotton States Exposition, Georgia Sep 22 - formation of the KMCD group, later to become the American Mutoscope Company, to exploit theMutoscope Nov 1 -SkladanowskyBioskop exhibited at Wintergarten Theatre, Berlin Nov 10 - LumièreCinématographe shown to Belgian Photographic Association, Palais du Midi, Brussels Dec 28 - LumièreCinématographe opens to paying public at Salon Indien, Grand Café, 14 boulevard des Capucines, Paris | 1895 May - Oscar Wilde brings unsuccessful libel action against Marquess of Queensberry of allegations of homosexuality Jun - Lord Salisbury becomes British prime minister leading Unionist administration Jul - Tension between Britain and USA over British Guiana-Venezuela boundary and the Monroe doctrine Nov -Wilhelm Röntgen discovers X-rays Dec - The Jameson Raid H.G. Wells publishesThe Time Machine |
| 1896 Jan 10 -Birt Acres exhibits projected film to the Lyonsdown Photographic Society, Barnet Feb 20 - LumièreCinématographe given press show at Polytechnic, Regent Street and opens to the public the following day Mar 9 - LumièreCinématographe begins engagement at Empire Theatre of Varieties, Leicester Square, London Apr 23 - EdisonVitascope opens to the public at Koster & Bial's Music Hall, New York May -Georges Méliès makes his first film,Une partie de cartes May 14 -Doublier andMoisson film the coronation ofTsar Nikolas II for Lumière and three days later Doublier gives Russia's first projected film show, in St Petersburg Jul 7 - LumièreCinématographe opens in India Aug 6 -Gabriel Veyre demonstrates the LumièreCinématographe before President Profirio Diaz in Mexico City Aug 11 - First projected film show in China Sep 18 -Barnett andSestier introduce projected film to Australia with the LumièreCinématographe Oct 3 -Queen Victoria is filmed at Balmoral Oct 12 - Public debut of theBiograph at Hammerstein's Olympic Music Hall Nov 3 -Marius Sestier takes the first Australian film, of the Melbourne Cup horse race | 1896 Mar - Ethiopia defeats Italy at Adowa Mar-Apr - The first modern Olympic Games held in Athens Jun -Persimmon wins the Derby Aug - Armenian massacre at Constantinople Nov - Republican William McKinley wins US presidential election Nobel prizes established Daily Mail newspaper founded in Britain |
| 1897 Jan -Alexandre Promio films in Egypt and Palestine Jan 24 -Gabriel Veyre exhibits the LumièreCinématographe in Havana, Cuba Feb 15 - First projected film show in Japan, presented byInabata Katsutaro, withConstant Girel operating the LumièreCinématographe Mar 17 - World heavyweight championship betweenCorbett andFitzsimmons at Carson City, Nevada filmed byEnoch Rector and Veriscope Company, resultant film over ninety minutes long May 4 - Nitrate film fire at the Bazar de la Charité causes many deaths Jun 22 - Diamond Jubilee procession ofQueen Victoria filmed by many of the major British and European film businesses | 1897 Apr - Greco-Turkish War Jun -Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee Aug - Formation of the Automobile Club of Great Britain (later the Royal Autombile Club) First Zionist Congress held in Basel, Switzerland Joseph John Thomson discovers the electron Edmond Rostand's playCyrano de Bergerac |
| 1898 Apr -James White and Frederick Blechynden film for Edison in China and Japan Jun -Affonso Segreto starts taking the first native Brazilian films Sep -A.C. Haddon takes the first ethnographic films, of the Torres Straits islanders Birt Acres introduces the first narrow-gauge camera-projector, theBirtac | 1898 Jan - Emile Zola producesJ'accuse in response toDreyfus trial Feb - Sinking of U.S.S.Maine at Havana Apr - USA declares war on Spain Aug - US forces capture Manila Sep - British victory at Omdurman under Kitchener Sep-Nov - Fashoda Incident Marie and Pierre Curie discover radium |
| 1899 Apr -Gabriel Veyre films in Indo-China Nov -H.S. Bhatvadekar takes the first native Indian film, of a wrestling match SpaniardDon Ramirez puts on the first film show in Turkey for Sultan Abdul Hamid II | 1899 May - peace conference held at The Hague Jun - retrial ordered inDreyfus case Sep -Dreyfus found guilty but pardoned by presidential decree Oct - Anglo-Boer War begins |
| 1900 Jan - First films of the Anglo-Boer War conflict in South Africa shown in Britain Jul - The Shah of Persia see the Lumière exhibit at the Paris Exposition and instructs court photographerAkkas Bashi to bring back a camera to Teheran, where he gives the first film shows | 1900 Feb - Relief of Ladysmith Feb - Formation of Labour Representation Committee in Britain (later the Labour Party) Apr - Paris Universal Exposition opens May - Relief of Mafeking Jun - Start of Boxer uprising in China Sigmund Freud'sThe Intepretation of Dreams Daily Express founded in Britain Max Planck first proposes the quantum theory |
| 1901 Jan -Edison's Black Maria studio closes Feb 1 - The funeral ofQueen Victoria is filmed by many British and European film companies | 1901 Jan 1 - Commonwealth of Australia founded Jan 22 - Death ofQueen Victoria |
Who's Who of Victorian Cinema: A Worldwide Survey