Early Cinema Gateway
General Resources
- Adventures in Cybersound
A huge collection of biographical information on inventors of all kinds, from Leonardo Da Vinci to Thomas Edison, with some emphasis on cinema's inventors and pioneers, such as Birt Acres, Robert Paul, W.K-L. Dickson, Georges Demeny, Eadweard Muybridge and Urban's associate G.A. Smith. All gathered together by Dr Russell Naughton, with photographs and links to the sources of information. - American Family Immigration History Center
This phenomenal new resource records the name, age, nationality, sex, marital status and vessel of every arrival at New York's Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924. It therefore serves as an outstanding research for tool for early film history - a regular crosser of the Atlantic such as Charles Urban is recorded several times, and the ships' manifests reveal those passengers that accompanied him. Other family history research resources such as the Mormon church's FamilySearch Internet Genealogy Service and Ancestry.com, which includes the Social Security Death Index for America, offer considerable assistance to those researching the personalities of the early film period. - American Film Institute
General site on America's "only national arts organization devoted to film, television and video". It includes the gaudy but exhaustive CineMedia guide to film links on the Net. - American Memory from the Library of Congress
Incomparable collection of early film clips from the Library of Congress, with substantial supporting information. Includes turn-of-the-century views of New York, the origins of American animation, American variety acts, views from the Spanish-American War, and the most recent addition, the Theodore Roosevelt collection (an accompanying essay, T.R. on Film, credits Charles Urban as the donor of some of these films). - Ancestry.com
See American Family Immigration History Center above. - Amia
The Association of Moving Image Archivists, "a non-profit professional association established to advance the field of moving image archiving by fostering cooperation among individuals and organizations concerned with the collection, preservation, exhibition and use of moving image materials". - Association Française de Recherche sur l'Histoire du Cinéma
A fine site for those with a scholarly interest in early cinema, including news, photos, links and details of the AFRHC journal 1895. In English and French. - The Bill Douglas Centre for the History of Cinema and Popular Culture
The late Bill Douglas, filmmaker and enthusiast for early and pre-cinema in all its many manifestiations, amassed a vast collection of books and artefacts. After his death the collection was donated by his partner Peter Jewell to the University of Exeter, which has now set up the Bill Douglas Centre, with the Bill Douglas and Peter Jewell Collection as its centrepiece. The site features examples from the collection, including magic lantern slides, panoramas, Chapliniana and treasures from cinema's heyday in the 1930s and 40s, while the catalogue is accessible through the AHDS Performing Arts. - The Bioscope
A blog reporting on the worlds of early and silent cinema, with an emphasis on research interests. There is an extensive list of links. - British Film Institute
The BFI has excellent resources on early cinema, notably in its National Film and Television Archive, which holds the majority of Urban's surviving films. Only a small amount of these film riches is indicated by its website, which includes catalogues of its films of the Boer War and of British silent comedies (both including Urban productions) and articles from Sight and Sound magazine on Edwin S. Porter and Louis Feuillade. However, the BFI site now includes full access to its BFI National Library book catalogue, an outstanding and very welcome resource. - Britannica.com
The Encyclopaedia Britannica entry for "Motion pictures, history of: Early Years, 1893-1910" is as sound and comprehensive an account of the early cinema period as one could hope to find. The sections of the "Motion Pictures" entry on colour mention of Kinemacolor. - CineGraph
Scholarly site on all aspects of the history of cinema, from a well-respected publisher. Text-heavy and in German, with a general site guide in English. - CineMedia
See American Film Institute above. - Classic Images
The site for the American collectors and film buffs' journal ranges widely over aspects of cinema history. The extensive book reviews section (mostly by Anthony Slide) includes a number of early cinema titles. - The Complete History of the Discovery of Cinematography
A hugely ambitious attempt by Paul Burns to trace the origins of motion pictures from 900 BC through to the arrival of cinematography at the end of the 19th century. The quality of the information is variable, too often plain wrong, and does not begin to challenge a published work such as Hermann Hecht's Pre-Cinema History (1993), but the undertaking is courageous and imaginative, and the illustrations are very welcome. - The Dead Media Project
The Dead Media Project, brainchild of Bruce Sterling, is a huge gathering together of evidence on forms of public communication that are now obsolete, from the pigeon post to ancient Irish fire beacons. Dead means of communicating by moving pictures are naturally included, and include media with which Urban was associated, such as the Kinora, Kinoplastikon and Kinemacolor, as well as host of still more exotically-named inventions. An amazing undertaking, strongly recommended. - Domitor
The site of the international organisation of scholars interested in early cinema, which holds bi-annual conferences, including an on-line bulletin and a list of members. Unfortunately the site has not been updated for quite some time. In English and French. - earlycinema.com
A promising new site with wide-ranging information on the early cinema period, biographies, timeline and an A-Z of terms. Some errors, huge gaps, but welcome enthusiasm. - Early Film Pioneers
Part of a film studies course from Winona University, this gives conventional information on Edison, the Lumières, Méliès, Porter and Griffith, with film clips of such titles as The Kiss, Arrival of a Train, A Trip to the Moon and The Great Train Robbery, using RealPlayer. - Early Visual Media
Idiosyncratic history of early types of visual media and their usage. Covers pre-cinema, photography, early film, conjuring and like subjects, with copious illustrations. - Filmsite
Film reference site, whose Film History section contains a useful nuts-and-bolts account of the early cinema period (mostly American cinema). - Le Giornate del Cinema Muto
More commonly known as the Pordenone Silent Film Festival (after its location in north western Italy), this is the site of the world's premier meeting place for silent films, scholars, archivists and enthusiasts. The Giornate also publishes the journal Griffithiana. In English and Italian. - Les Indépendants du 1er Siècle
Curiously eclectic site on French filmmakers of the 20th century, including entries on figures from the early cinema period: Albert Capellani, Emile Cohl, Louis Feuillade, Alice Guy and Max Linder. In French. - The Internet Movie Database
The IMDb's coverage of silent film generally is constantly improving, as numerous dedicated and attentive contributors supply generally reliable information. But a look at Charles Urban's few credits makes it clear that its coverage of early cinema remains minimal and rather eccentric. - Intertitle-o-Rama
Trascribed titles for over 200 feature films from the silent era, including several titles from the pre-1915 period, including Judith of Bethulia, Traffic in Souls and From the Manger to the Cross. An entertaining feature is a selection of some of the ripest titles ("You may kill me, Queen, but the love in my soul for you will never perish!") on the front page menu. - KINtop
The site of the esteemed German early cinema magazine KINtop is partly under construction. In German and English. - Library of Congress Online Catalog
The catalogue of the Library of Congress has recently gone on-line, and this includes its film holdings. It is still very rare for any of the larger non-commercial film archives to put the full range of their holdings on-line, and this is a major searching tool for early film. - London Project Database
A database of film businesses and cinemas in London before the First World War has been published by the AHRC Centre for British Film and Television Studies at Birkbeck, University of London. Its year-long 'London Project' investigated the nature of the film business in London 1894-1914 and the main output of the research is a database, which includes a map of London boroughs linked to database results. There are several businesses associated with Charles Urban. - Media Reference Sources & Information
Links to various cinema history and general cinema, television and video resources, with helpful descriptions. From the University of California of Berkeley. - MOMI
In 1999 London's Museum of the Moving Image (MOMI) closed, awaiting the promised construction of a new museum. Filling the gap, and making his own subtle protest, Stephen Herbert (producer of The Projection Box) has devised an unofficial on-line version of the sections of the Museum that covered pre-cinema and early cinema. Beautifully illustrated and animated, it is the first place to learn about magic lanterns, the phantasmagoria, panoramas, zoetropes, phenakistoscopes, chronophotography and the first twenty years of cinema. - Motion Picture and Television Reading Room (Library of Congress)
How to use the reading room of the Library of Congress's Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division, including very welcome collection guides and finding aids. - Motion Pictures Catalog
Guide to an extensive microfilm edition of catalogues of American motion picture producers and distributors from 1894-1908. Features a detailed introduction by Charles Musser, and the contents listing for each reel, including Maguire & Baucus (Urban's American employers), Raff and Gammon, Lumière, Lubin, Gaumont, Méliès, Biograph and many others. - The National Archives
The National Archives (formerly the Public Record Office) is the repository for British official papers, and is a marvellous source of information on British early cinema, if you know where to look (primarily the company records in the Board of Trade files). The catalogue is now on-line, and while to access the actual documents one must visit Kew, having the catalogue searchable in this form is an immense boon, and yields up serendipitious results that one would be unlikely to discover using the indexes at Kew alone. (The improved version of the catalogue that is now available, The Catalogue, aids the researcher all the more and enables material to be booked in advance for registered users of the PRO). - National Media Museum
The National Media Museum (formerly the National Museum of Photography Film and Television) in Bradford is Britain's national museum of photography, film and television, and has a strong Urban association as it now houses the Charles Urban collection of papers. The Research section of the site includes a number of useful guides (Adobe Acrobat reader required) to aspects of film and television history, including biographies of film pioneers, among these Urban, G.A. Smith, W.K-L. Dickson, Birt Acres and Robert Paul. - 100 Years of Cinema in Europe
Well-researched site on the history of cinema exhibition in Europe, with sections devoted to France, Italy, Great Britain, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway, Hungary, Switzerland, Finland, Denmark, Belgium, Austria and Luxembourg, giving welcome detail on production and exhibition in the earliest years for each country. In English and Italian. - Public Motion Picture Research Centers and Film Archives
Comprehensive list of links to film archives worldwide, provided by the Library of Congress. - Quellen zur Filmgeschichte
Produced by the extraordinarily industrious Herbert Birett, this features huge amounts of information about films either made or shown in Germany 1912-1920, plus film trade journals of the time and mentions of film in non-movie journals. some of it listed, some of it downloadable files, some of it available from the author. Some interesting links. In German, with some notes in English. - Screening the Past
On-line cinema history journal, with news, reviews and articles, both original and classic reprints with scholarly introductions. - Screenonline
Impressive online encyclopdia and moving image educational resource from the British Film Institute. Combines the history of British film and television, through a complex strucutre based around themes, personalities, tours and special features. The biographical resources include many early cinema figures (including Charles Urban), taken from The Encyclopedia of British Film and The Reference Guide to British and Irish Film Directors. Screenonline comes with a huge number of streamed video clips, which are accessbile to UK educational users only. These include a number of classic early cinema titles, and a wide range of selections from the Topical Budget newsreel. - ScreenSound Australia
The Australian national archive of moving images and sound, ScreenSound Australia, has made its database of 360,000 titles available online, searchable by keyword (use also for dates) and name. The cataloguing detail is often excellent, and there is much interesting early material available. The option to call up viewable material only is very welcome. - Silent Film Bookshelf
Superb site, edited by David Pierce, which reprints original articles on silent cinema from contemporary film trade journals, as well as more recent criticism. Unfortunately, the site has not been updated since 2000. Sister site to Silent Film Sources. - Silent Film Sources - Silent Films Availability in the U.S.
A guide to all sources for silent films in the USA, from video to 35mm theatrical hire. Sister site to the Silent Film Bookshelf. - Silent Movies
An assortment of links to other silent film sites, plus some general information (and a long-promised section on colour in silent film to come). Produced by Glen Pringle. - Terra Media
A growing site on the history of the media, at the heart of which is a timeline section entitled Chronomedia, which aims to document important moments in the history of all communications media, and which includes technological "firsts" and innovations in motion pictures in the 1890s to 1900s. - Thomas A. Edison Papers
The Edison papers 1850-1898 have recently been made available on-line, many of them viewable as images. They include documents of the roots of the American film business, including the development of the Kinetoscope under W.K-L. Dickson, and Edison's commercial dealings with Maguire & Baucus and the Continental Commerce Company, employers of Charles Urban. Thorough identifications and indexing, a model of how to present documents on the Net, a superb resource all round. - UCLA Film and Television Archive
One of the key international film archives, with a searchable database via UCLA's Orion2 public access catalogue, which allows searches to be restricted to just film and television material. - Who's Who of Victorian Cinema
A biographical guide to filmmaking (in its broadest sense) in the late nineteenth-century, based on the 1996 book publication of the same title. Includes a wide range of extra resources designed both to aid the Victorian film specilaist and to help those with a general interest in the late-Victorian period.