In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants (1913)

Record Details:

Title:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants
Date:
1913
Publisher:
New York, Appeal Printing Co.
Volume:
In the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the United States of America, petitioner, vs. Motion Picture Patents Company, et al., defendants : record volume 1
Leaf #:
000181
Language:
English
Collection:
Early Cinema and Government & Law
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
The Museum of Modern Art Library, New York
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
These seven volumes contain the testimonies and supporting documents from the U.S. District Court's antitrust lawsuit against the Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC). Formed in 1908, the MPPC (sometimes referred to asœ"the Edison Trust" or just "the Trust") sought to control the American film industry through pooling patents and demanding that producers and exhibitors acquire licenses to those patents. Independent producers and exhibitors, who refused to license the patents, argued that the MPPC was an unlawful monopoly. In 1912 and 1913, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania heard testimonies from both MPPC members, such as Siegmund Lubin, and "Independents" who later became Hollywood moguls, such as William Fox. Ultimately, in 1915, the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which found the MPPC in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act and spelled the end for the already weakening MPPC. -- Eric Hoyt, 2012
Date Added:
September 21, 2023
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Opinion on Camera and Film Patent. 159 purpose of preventing the sensitized plate, owing to its acquired velocity, going beyond the position to which it is brought by the click, and at which it should be perfectly immovable during the duration of the luminous impression. A pressing button, b, rests firmly against the plate from the time that it is introduced into the apparatus; and it is through the influence of such pressure thai the plate is made to adhere to the posterior surface of the disk containing the apertures. This surface is covered with black velvet to prevent slipping. Focusing is effected by shortening or elongating the barrel, thus moving the objective backward or forward. The focus is finally verified by observing, through an aperture in the breech piece, the sharpness of the image received on a piece of ground glass." He states that he has photographed with his apparatus horses, asses, dogs, and men on foot and on velocipedes, but he has not followed such experiments up, as they entered into the programme that Mr. Muybridge had carried out with so much success. He proposes especially to study by photography the mechanism of flight in different animals. Mr. Le Vinson, in an article published in the Brooklyn Eagle of June 14, 1888, describes a camera apparatus for taking a series of pictures of objects in motion, in which a single lens is employed to operate upon plates 3% by 41/4 inches in size. These plates are carried in compartments on a polygonal wheel, which is caused to move onward and rest by a peculiar screw motion, and while at rest an electromagnet, actuated by a suitable battery, operates the shutter and exposes the plate, then in proper position for the lens. He says the mechanism employed to drive the plate carrier could be employed to operate a continuous strip of paper or a film carrier, and by a simple modification of the contactswitch the shutter may be operated indefinitely; and with a camera thus constructed a series of pictures, limited only b/y the length of the sensitive paper, may be taken. The mechanism of the apparatus is not detailed, except in the general way stated. It is apparent from the references considered that while Mr. Edison was not the first to devise a camera apparatus for