The phonoscope (Nov 1896-Dec 1899)

Vol. I. No. 5 THE PHONOSCOPE 1 ©uv battler Tlie good people of Naples were treated the other day to an amusing experience of the vagaries of the kinematograph. Two or three series of moving pictures were successfully reeled off, and then the machinery stuck. The operator frantically worked to get matters right, but though be perspired in every pore, the screen showed simply impenetrable darkness, at first the music kept the spectators a little quiet, but as time passed and the darkness continued, signs of impatience commenced to make themselves evident. At this juncture a brilliant idea struck the demonstrator. "Ladies and gentlemen," said he ' 'you have before you a scene representing a deadly conflict between two savage tribes of negrbs in a dark railway tunnel." Some one has discovered that Skakespeare knew all about the X-rays, for Hamlet casually remarks to his queen mother: "Come, come and sit you down, you shall not budge. You go not till I set you up a glass, Where you may see the inmost part of you. There is one man, so the story goes, who curses long and loudly the cinematograph. In his amiable, husbandly way he took his wife to see the "cin" (new abbreviation), and in the Sun lay afternoon disembarkation scene, his better half saw what she believed to be her husband coming ashore with another lady. To be the more convinced, she saw the tableau fully half-a-dozen times with the aid of opera glasses. The accused male indignantly denies everything, but as he cannot prove a complete alibi for that particular Sunday afternoon, and his wife won't entertain the idea of an "extraordinary likeness," there is a big storm in the once happy home. If Miss Pauline Fletcher becomes Mis. Auguste Van Biene and moves from New York to Berlin, the phonograph will be responsible. MissFletcher is an actress — a tall, blonde, pretty woman, who does not know peroxide. Van Biene is a short, round little man, who plays the 'cello. Miss Fletcher's home is in the far West and she often longs for her native prairie. So when Van Biene played "Home, Sweet Home, ' on his 'celloshe thought it the finest music she had ever heard. The 'cello made them acquaintances. Several suppers and strolls through the park made them friends, and then — but let the phonograph speak for itself. Pauline was continually asking Auguste to play "Home, Sweet Home," for her. "I'll play it in a phonograph," said he, "While I am thinking only of you. Then you can hear it whenever you like." The next day Miss Fletcher was invited to hear the familiar tune. Van Biene touched the spring of the instrument while the actress poised herself prettily near it, all attention. "Through pleasures and palaces" — began the phonograph in music. "Oh Pauline, how beautiful you are" — the machine continued. Miss Fletcher looked astonished and a faint color rose in her cheeks. "Wherever I roam," continued the instrument. "Ah, darling, with what grace you leaned over the balcony as Juliet to-night." "Be it ever so humble." "Oh, that I were a glove upon thy hand that I might touch they cheek" — ■ "There's no place like home." "Never have I loved as I love now, never" "Home, home" "Oh, darling, I" The words of a proposal of marriage, even though they were spoken into a phonograph, will not be given. Van Biene's bashfulness was overcome, but Miss Fletcher would not say last hight whether she was engaged to him or not. n7 The spell of "scopes" and "graphs," under which we have labored ever since the first modernized magic lantern began to squirt continuous pictures on a screen in an out-of-the-way little shop far down town, continues unabated. With infinite pains I have undertaken to compile a list of the frantic diversity of freakish names that have been foisted upon us to designate these otherwise admirable contrivances. The list is, I fondly believe a heartbreaker. Behold not alone the eidoloscope, which was the name of the original downtown outfit, but also [the biograph, bioscope, verascope, vitagraph, cinematographe, cinematoscope, cinetoscope, cineo graph, kinematograph, kinematoscope, kinetograph, kinetoscope, kineoptiscope, triograph, tiioscope, centograph, zimograph, multiscope, hypnoscope, vitamotograph, magniscope, magiscope, animatograph, animatoniscope, kineoptican, motograph, mutagraph, alethoscope, projectoscope, and last and most dreadful, phantographoscope. There may be others, but are not these a feast ? Over in London they have concocted a nefarious scheme by which the machines have been christened for the houses whereat they have been exploited, this plan serving to bring forth such awful names as alhambrainatograph and empiretograph. Let us be thankful that our managers have not seen fit to afflct us with an Olympiagraph, a Kosterandbialoscope.a Keithoscope, a Proctoropticon, a Tonypastorgraph, or even a Weberandfieldoscope. An insurance company, inculcating in its annual report the wisdom of insurance, and seeking to confirm the truth of the adage, "Nothing is so certain to happen as the unexpected," mentions a number of queer accidents, and the utmost of consolation in dollars which the policyholder or his heirs in each case received. The list was as follows: Solicitor, fell over bag, $400; hotel proprietor, soda water, bottle burst, $350; drummer, trod on rusty nail, blood poisoning, death, $5,000; secretary, fell over mat, $700; gentleman swallowed false teeth while asleep, death, $5,000; printer, carrying open umbrella, fell over obstruction, $60; gentleman missed dog when trying to kick him, struck sofa instead, injured great toe, $75; solicitor, struck by falling centre-piece, in drawing-room, $30; merchant, kicking mud off foot, sprained ankle, $55, lawyer, walked against open door of wardrobe in the dark, $1,000. The devil himself appears to be in the Cinematographe people. I have been patting them vigorously on the back for a couple of weeks because they put up a good show, and now they are as bad as ever, and turn up with a brand new trick. They change the labels on the films and try and make you think it's a new one. They do have a majority of films not seen here, but the pictures on the screens are indistinct, and there is a return of the old vibration noticed several weeks ago. The motion photograph machines are good for a year yet if properly handled, but we must have plenty of new views well presented. The penny-wise-pound-foolish idea of letting any old thing go is bound to bring disaster sooner or later, and it is more apt to come sooner than later. This means everybody, not alone the Cinematographe. IRovelttes 1Hp to Bate This is an age of new things and desires that are ever moving. There seems to be a feverish eagerness on the part of the people for constant amusement, and manufacturers who cater to this feeling have a wide field before them. The Novelty Export Co. are promoters and introducers of all sorts of fancy inventions and novelties. They have been established about two years, and have met with a veiy popular success. Among the most widely sold of their specialties are the paper novelty, the Kinetoscope, the sale of which they are now pushing, and of which they handle about 60,000 daily, and the Phonograph and Gramophone Musical Records, of which they carry an immense stock of the finest and highest grades on the market. The Automatic Photograph Machine, which produces a perfect picture in one minute, is another one of their novelties which has met with a grand success. As makers of this, the members of the Novelty Export Co. are also members of the Automatic Photograph Machine Co., organized with a capital of $500,000. The President of this company is a man of strong organizing ability and liberal ideas. These companies do business in all the great European centres — Loudon, Paris, Hamburg, and throughout India, Japan, and China. They have shipped within the past three months 75,000 novelties to Berlin, 200,000 to London, and a 100,000 lot to Sweden. The main office is in New York, but their business extends to every part of the world. Mbeve Zbey Mere Etbtbiteb last fIDontb Vitascope Vitascope Hall, Washington, D. C; Birmingham, Ala. ; Central High School, Kansas City, Mo. ; , Auditorium, Parkersburg, W. Va.; East Lake, Birmingham, Ala. Kinematographe Collin's and Peucoast Hall, Camden, N. J. Biograph Wil lard's Hall, Washington, D. C; Association Hall, Trenton, N. J.; Keith's Theatre, Boston , Mass. Zinematograph Huber's Museum. Gneograph Duluth, Minn. Kinetoscope Odeon, Marshalltown, la.; Grand Opera House Sioux City, la. Projectoscope Opera House, Augusta, Ga. ; Metropolitan Opera House, Raleigh, N. C; First M. E. Church, New Brunswick, N. J.; Opera House, Columbia, S. C. ; Academy, Greenboro, N. C. ; Hibernian Hall, Charleston, S. C. ; Opera House, Piedmont, W. Va. Cinematograph Carnegie Hall, Alleghany, Pa.; Grand Opera House, Boston, Mass. ; Eden Musee, N. Y. Cinematoscope City Hall, Springfield, O.; Eden Musee, N. Y. Bioscope Austin and Stone's Museum, Boston, Mass. Phantograph Grand, Grand Rapids, Mich.