Nickelodeon movie theater
Encyclopedia
Lecture
thumb|A lecture on [[linear algebra]] at the [[Helsinki University of Technology]]A lecture is an oral presentation intended to present information or teach people about a particular subject, for example by a university or college teacher. Lectures are used to convey critical information, history,...
s. Nickelodeons were one of the two main exhibition venues for motion pictures, apart from Vaudeville
Vaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
theaters.
Nickelodeons declined with the advent of the feature film
Feature film
In the film industry, a feature film is a film production made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie...
, and as cities grew and industry consolidation led to larger, more comfortable, and better-appointed movie theaters.
History
The name "Nickelodeon" was first used in 1888 by Austin's Nickelodeon, a dime museumDime museum
Dime museums were institutions that were briefly popular at the end of the 19th century in the United States. Designed as centers for entertainment and moral education for the working class , the museums were distinctly different from upper-middle class' cultural events...
located in Boston, Massachusetts. However, the term was popularized by Harry Davis and John P. Harris
John P. Harris
John Paul Harris was a Pittsburgh businessman and politician who opened the world's first theater devoted entirely to showing Motion pictures....
, who opened their small, storefront theatre with that name on Smithfield Street in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
on June 19, 1905. Although it was not the first theater to show films, in 1919 a news article stated that it was the first theater in the world "devoted exclusively to exhibition of moving picture spectacles." Davis and Harris found such great success with their operation that their concept of a five cent theatre running movies continuously was soon imitated by hundreds of ambitious entrepreneurs, as was the name of the theatre itself. Louis B. Mayer
Louis B. Mayer
Louis Burt Mayer born Lazar Meir was an American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the "star system" within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B...
came of age just as the popularity of the nickelodeon was beginning to rise; he renovated the "Gem Theater" in Haverhill, Massachusetts
Haverhill, Massachusetts
Haverhill is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 60,879 at the 2010 census.Located on the Merrimack River, it began as a farming community that would evolve into an important industrial center, beginning with sawmills and gristmills run by water power. In the...
, converting it into a nickelodeon he opened in 1907 as the "Orpheum Theater", and announced that it would be "the home of refined entertainment devoted to Miles Brothers
Miles Brothers
The four Miles brothers, Harry, Herbert, Joseph, and Earle C, were pioneers in American cinema. In 1902, they established one of the first motion picture exchanges in the United States....
moving pictures and illustrated songs
Illustrated songs
An illustrated song is a type of performance art and was a popular form of entertainment in the early 20th century in the United States.Live performers and music recordings were both used by different venues to accompany still images projected from glass slides...
". Other well-known nickelodeon owners were the Skouras Brothers
Skouras Brothers
The Skouras Brothers Enterprises Inc. was an American movie theater chain from the early days of film-making based in St. Louis, Missouri. It was owned and operated by three brothers: Charles, Spyros and George...
of St. Louis.
Types of "moving pictures"
Nickelodeons would show films which were typically ten to fifteen minutes in length, and in a variety of styles and subjects, such as short narratives, "scenics" (views of the world from moving trains), "actualities" (precursors of later documentary films), illustrated songs, local or touring song and dance acts, comediesComedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...
, melodrama
Melodrama
The term melodrama refers to a dramatic work that exaggerates plot and characters in order to appeal to the emotions. It may also refer to the genre which includes such works, or to language, behavior, or events which resemble them...
s, problem plays, stop action sequences
Pixilation
Pixilation is a stop motion technique where live actors are used as a frame-by-frame subject in an animated film, by repeatedly posing while one or more frame is taken and changing pose slightly before the next frame or frames. The actor becomes a kind of living stop motion puppet...
, sporting events (e.g. the 1897 Corbett
James J. Corbett
James John "Gentleman Jim" Corbett was an Irish-American heavyweight boxing champion, best known as the man who defeated the great John L. Sullivan. He also coached boxing at the Olympic Club in San Francisco...
-Fitzsimmons
Bob Fitzsimmons
Robert James "Bob" Fitzsimmons , was a British boxer who made boxing history as the sport's first three-division world champion. He also achieved fame for beating Gentleman Jim Corbett, the man who beat John L. Sullivan, and is in The Guinness Book of World Records as the Lightest heavyweight...
championship fight or the 1899 Jeffries
James J. Jeffries
James Jackson Jeffries was a world heavyweight boxing champion.His greatest assets were his enormous strength and stamina. Using a technique taught to him by his trainer, former welterweight and middleweight champion Tommy Ryan, Jeffries fought out of a crouch with his left arm extended forward...
-Sharkey
Tom Sharkey
Tom 'Sailor Tom' Sharkey was a boxer who fought two fights with heavyweight champion James J. Jeffries. Sharkey's recorded ring career spanned from 1893 to 1904. He is credited with having won 40 fights , 7 losses, and 5 draws...
fight) and other features which allowed them to compete with vaudeville
Vaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
houses.
The titles of a few of the films released in 1907 and distributed to nickelodeons by the Miles Brothers (Herbert, Harry and Earl C.) partially illustrate this diversity.
Decline
Though strong through the period between 1905 and 1913, Nickelodeon theaters would also face their downfall after the arrival of longer films and larger audiences. Box office attendance grew rapidly, necessitating larger auditoriums. Longer films caused ticket prices to double from five cents to ten cents.
See also
- NickelodeonNickelodeon (film)Nickelodeon is a 1976 comedy film directed by Peter Bogdanovich and starring Ryan O'Neal, Burt Reynolds, and Tatum O'Neal. According to Bogdanovich, the film was based on true stories told to him by silent movie directors Alan Dwan and Raoul Walsh...
, a 1976 film about the early days of the silent movies business. - The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago has an exhibit, Yesterday's Main Street, which includes a working mock-up of a nickelodeon.
External links and sources
- The Nickelodeons, written by Joseph Medill PattersonJoseph Medill PattersonJoseph Medill Patterson was an American journalist and publisher, grandson of publisher Joseph Medill, founder of the Chicago Tribune and a mayor of Chicago, Illinois.-Family:...
and published in the November 23, 1907 issue of The Saturday Evening PostThe Saturday Evening PostThe Saturday Evening Post is a bimonthly American magazine. It was published weekly under this title from 1897 until 1969, and quarterly and then bimonthly from 1971.-History:... - "Story films" distributed by the Miles Brothers, from the American Film InstituteAmerican Film InstituteThe American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
Catalog of Feature Films