You saw it here first: Pittsburgh's Nickelodeon introduced the moving picture theater to the masses in 1905
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The world's film industry started in Pittsburgh, 100 years ago today, in a dingy storeroom teeming with working-class immigrants, sexual tension, danger and the still-fresh thrill of seeing moving pictures.
A ceremony and plaque on Smithfield Street celebrated the 50th anniversary of the first Nickelodeon, which opened in June 1905. The plaque, replaced with one honoring the Nickelodeon's founder, has a few inaccuracies: the two moving pictures it mentions were produced at least two years after the Nickelodeon opened and the title of one film is given as "The Battled Burglar" -- the correct title is "The Baffled Burglar."Click photo for larger image.
The mix was so volatile that during the first day, 450 people watched movies at the new theater, which its owners dubbed the "Nickelodeon." By the second day, more than 1,500 people stood in line to see movies there, and eventually the Smithfield Street site became known as the world's first modern movie theater.
Others were taking note. Social activists grew worried about children spending too much time at the movies, because of their violent and sexual themes. Some were afraid of the immigrant labor pool attracted to the silent films -- which didn't need to be in English to be understood -- and others feared the idea of women in dark rooms mixing with strange men.
But the most important thing of all, at least for Pittsburgh's essential place in film history, was the mere sight of hundreds of people lining up to pay 5 cents to see a 15-minute moving picture show.
Movies became a business because of Pittsburgh. Thousands of copycat nickelodeons were built in cities all over the country on the Nickelodeon model, and a system of producing films and then distributing them to theaters nationwide grew in order to feed the new phenomenon.
A Hill District film distribution company got into the theater business, eventually becoming the Metro Film Co. and later Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer. Members of the Warner and Selznick families -- later legends in Hollywood -- saw movie theater and distribution techniques for their first time in Pittsburgh, before taking them west.
So, for a flash of time after the Nickelodeon opened on June 19, 1905, Pittsburgh was the epicenter of the film world. But the spark quickly went out, and 100 years later, the city's place in film history is mostly ignored, even in the city itself.
First Published June 19, 2005 12:00 am
