Cinematic Era: 1901 Vintage

The cook has trouble lighting the stove, so she adds kerosene, with explosive results. No primary source credits a director for this film.

Time-lapse photography showing the one month-long demolition of the Star Theatre in New York.

Documentary filmed by Fructuoso Gelabert at the Spanish coast.

Only part of the film has survived.

Mitchell & Kenyon.

Single shot of the finish of a rowing race at Henley Regatta.

A very short, simple trick film with some pool divers in reverse.

The scene opens in a beautiful garden scene. St. Elmo appears and proceeds to twist his anatomy into wonderful shapes. Several mysterious changes add great attraction to this subject.

The film shows a parade down Fifth Avenue, New York. In the foreground many children, both black and white, can be seen following alongside the parade. The participants in the parade include cowboys, Indians, and soldiers in the uniform of the United States Cavalry on horseback and riding horse-drawn coaches. Buffalo Bill can be seen on horseback, lifting his hat to the crowd. Filmed on 1 April 1901.

A high nobleman finds himself in the Temple of the Sun, where he meets Mascarille, who proposes himself as a juggler. After extracting from the nobleman's nose several playing cards, Mascarille enlarges these cards and transforms them into the flags of all nations. From these flags he extricates a group of beauties. The nobleman begins to pay court to the ladies. Instantly the group disappears and the lord finds himself face to face with an animated Sun, who starts in a grotesque dance. The Sun is changed to a pumpkin. Then the devil appears, replaces the head of the lord with the pumpkin and drives him away with an enormous candlestick, which sends out flames and smoke.

Lancashire's St Helens, in hooped shirts, visited Cheshire rivals Warrington for this early Edwardian game. As in other Mitchell and Kenyon rugby films, we can see here an early phase of the evolution of Northern Union rules: note the quickly-formed scrum after each tackle. Shots along the touchline show officials and spectators transfixed by the play, while others are distracted by the camera. The Northern Rugby Football Union, better known as Northern Union, was formed in 1895, when prominent Yorkshire and Lancashire clubs resigned from the Rugby Football Union in a dispute over compensation for players taking time off work. All the major differences between the two codes would be established by 1907.

A satire on the way that audiences unaccustomed to the cinema didn't know how to react to the moving images on a screen - in this film, an unsophisticated (and stereotypical) country yokel is alternately baffled and terrified, in the latter case by the apparent approach of a steam train.

A fine picture of the champion and his brother in a very lively one-round sparring bout. The muscles of the champion are shown to excellent advantage, and aside from being a very lively and interesting sparring exhibition the film presents an absolutely perfect photograph of the champion and his brother.

Two Boers shoot and rob a sentry.

A conjuror appears to demonstrate a lady with three heads.

Studies on human pathological locomotion.

In the center of the ring the trainer forms a pile of baskets many feet in height. Greyhounds leap in rapid succession, forming a graceful arch and landing on the ground as lightly as so many feathers. The position of the camera was a most happy one, as the dogs appeared to leap directly toward the audience and the film is both beautiful and exciting.

Close view of legs and feet passing a basement window.

Did he bowl or did he throw? A fascinating record of an early cricketing controversy.

Lost short film from Georges Méliès.

Likely a popular routine from Percy Honri's musical theatre show. His face is seen poking through a blackout curtain, made up as the man in the moon. A hat and puppet body appears, strumming a ukulele.

James J. Jeffries throwing the medicine ball. An absolutely perfect picture of the champion heavyweight of the world.

Film produced by William K. Dickson’s British Mutoscope and Biograph Company.

The annual championship meeting of England's premier athletics association.

A sudden gust of wind sweeps Auntie's bonnet from her head, and she, in attempting to regain it, becomes overbalanced and falls over the stone-wall, landing on her bustle. (Edison film catalog)

The champion lady boxers of the world. Shows two female pugilists who are really clever. They engage in a hot one-round sparring bout. A park, with marble entrance and walk, and beautiful trees and shrubbery, make a very pleasing background. The exhibition is very lively from start to finish; the blows fall thick and fast, and some very clever pugilistic generalship is shown. Sold complete or in separate lengths.

A temperance society decries the demon drink on the streets of Edwardian Manchester.

An extraordinary window on to the heart of cosmopolitan Shanghai over a hundred years ago - a true melting pot of cultures. Today the city's main shopping hub, Nanjing Road is here bustling with crowds of Chinese and Europeans and patrolled by Sikhs who made up an important part of the international police force. It is the only known surviving example of the film reportage shot by British war correspondent Joe Rosenthal during his coverage of the Boxer Rebellion in China between 1900 and 1901.

Directed by Robert W. Paul.

A short dance film in Pathécolor, also know as stencil colouring. The editing cuts correspond with the dancers' costume changes. More about stencil colouring at http://zauberklang.ch/filmcolors/timeline-entry/1218/.

Here we see one of the methods employed in the search for gold, where water is scarce. We see the workmen using the water over and over again in the rocker until it becomes too thick with earth for further use. The scene is one of action, as the valuable character of the ground enables many to work profitably in close quarters. An interesting and instructive subject.

Here we have recorded a very novel scene, the camera having been placed in the basket of the captive balloon at the Pan-American Exposition...

Batley go down to Lancashire rivals Salford in the very first season of the Northern Rugby League.

Thousands of people got together on Easter Monday for the traditional egg rolling.

A short documentary registering the meeting between two aviation pioneers: the Brazilian Santos Dumont and the Briton Charles Rolls. In it, Dumont presents his ideas for a future balloon, showing to Rolls the concept of such invention and the project with his notes, all of which the other man delightfully enjoys.

This is an extraordinary window on to the heart of cosmopolitan Shanghai, over a hundred years ago, featuring a Nanjing Road bustling with crowds of Chinese, Sikhs and Europeans. It is the only known surviving example of the film reportage shot by British war correspondent Joe Rosenthal during his coverage of the Boxer Rebellion in China between 1900 and 1901.

A small battalion of Yorkshire schoolchildren lines up for a playground photograph.

Shows a suburbanite asleep in bed. He discovers he has overslept himself, and jumps out of bed.

This film documents the return of R.P. Paranjpye, the first Indian to achieve the distinction of 'Wrangler' at Cambridge, to Mumbai from England. It is considered one of the earliest examples of Indian newsreel footage.

Lost comedy short film by Georges Méliès.

Girls gut herring on the quay at North Shields while a Showman tries to stir up trouble.

Actuality film documenting the funeral of Queen Victoria in February 1901. The footage captures the solemn processions and ceremonies that marked the end of her long reign, offering a rare moving-image record of a major state occasion. Widely circulated internationally, the film reflects both the global reach of British newsreel subjects and the early power of cinema to record historic events.

This clip shows part of the official parade for the Inauguration of the Commonwealth on 1 January 1901 as it passes through the temporary gate built especially for the occasion in Hyde Park, Sydney.

Shot against a painted backdrop of river with town on other bank & mountains behind. Throwing medicine ball while group of men watch, at least one black. He stands up & gets hit on head with ball. Jeffries shadow boxing & dancing with weights in hands. Sparring barehanded, or wrestling with another man.

Liverpool was a flourishing, prosperous city in 1901 and this display of English patriotism and civic pride was one of several events in the city captured on film that year. We see the throng of onlookers around Nelson's monument and Castle Street as the procession wends its way to St. George's Hall.

Shot at the intersection of Holy Corner in Liverpool, this street is a hive of people and traffic. Arguably during the first part of this century most trade was being conducted on the streets. When this was being filmed Liverpool had become a wealthy city, and the shop fronts are filled with items for sale.

A companion picture to No. 1964 ('Cutting Sugar Cane' (1901) (q.v.)), and equally interesting. Honolulu, Hawaii.

A panoramic view taken from Young's Pier, showing the boardwalk, the auditorium pier, new steel pier...

In this picture there is a limited amount of action in the pose. As the curtains are drawn aside the shell appears shut. It gradually opens, disclosing the model curled up in a recumbent position. She slowly arises as if awakening, and gracefully assumes the final position of the pose.

Shows two lovers in a hammock. Two bad boys appear. One of them climbs into a tree and scrambles out on an overhanging branch, directly over the happy pair. Just as the love-making reaches a climax, the branch breaks. The boy falls into the hammock, the hammock breaks, and the boy and the lovers are mixed up on the ground. Exceedingly ludicrous.

On the closing day of the Pan-American Exposition, Saturday, November 2d, 1901, a sham battle took place at the Stadium on the Pan-American Exposition grounds...

A film from the UK based Mitchell & Kenyon.

The might of the British Navy struts its stuff down the Manchester Ship Canal.

Edwardian cycling competition.

The picture was taken in the Gypsy tent at the Pan-American Exposition and shows ten beautiful Gypsy girls executing the famous Gypsy dance that created such a furore at the Exposition...