Autumn Years Fall 2023

Soon the excitement over one- or two minute story-less flicks began to wane. That led Edison Studios to create the first movie with a plot, entitled The Great Train Robbery , in 1903. In 1907, Edison’s movie Rescued from an Eagle’s Nest was shot on the Palisades in Fort Lee (the film was D.W. Griffith’s first starring role as an actor). As films of greater length and interest were made, there arose a demand for actual movie theaters. Since the admission price was usually 5 cents, theaters were known as Nickelodeons. Bergen County’s first dedicated movie theater (a permanent location where the primary focus was to show films), called the Edisonia , opened on Main Street in Hackensack on June 12, 1907. Advertised as “here to stay as a permanent fixture,” it was located in a storefront on the first floor of a wood building. Admission for “the latest and best moving picture plays” was 5 cents. By September, the price went up to 10 cents, although chil

dren received coupons at school that al lowed them to attend for 5 cents (before the 7:30pm main show). New pictures were offered daily, except Sundays (the Blue Laws prohibited showings on Sun days). Everything was running fine until the night of October 19, 1907, when the projector was stolen. Without a projec tor, the theater closed. County residents were not without entertainment, however, since the Star Theatre had opened in Carlstadt on July 5, 1907, at the corner of Broad and Sec ond Streets (today a park). Admission

Reporting on an upcoming traveling moving-pictures show at the Hacken sack Armory in 1903, The Record news paper lamented that moving pictures without “all the realistic sounds are far from satisfactory.” Presenting the movie at the armory was a team from the Ly man H. Howe Moving Picture Co., which was the first known to address that issue. Howe was the first person to use a phonograph for background sound effects for movies. The armory show’s large audience was thrilled with the hour-and-a-half presentation of short films, including travelogues, comedies and a profile on the life of Napoleon. The favorite, though, was a film shot from the front of a train going through a western canyon.

Scene from Edison’s Rescued from an Eagle’s Nest.

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AUTUMN YEARS I FALL 2023