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Messter Improves the Theatrograph
Oskar Messter, the father of German Cinema, was born in Berlin on the 21st November 1866 to Eduard Messter, the owner of a company that manufactured and marketed optical and medical apparatus. Messter Junior joined his father’s company in 1884 as an apprentice optician, and assumed control of the company from his father ten years later. It was only after reading about the Lumiere Brothers and their “living photography” early in 1896 that he became interested in the projection of moving pictures.
Messter tried to acquire a Cinematographe from the Lumieres, but they were selling to no-one at the time. Undeterred, Messter obtained a Theatrograph in April 1896, and apparently set about improving upon it by “inventing” a Maltese Cross mechanism (as with so many of the mass of new inventions during this frenetic period in cinema’s history, many people, working independently on inventing solutions to common problems, can each justifiably claim to be “the” inventor of certain devices – Eugene Lauste and Robert Paul both came up with variations of the Maltese Cross mechanism at roughly the same time). Messter is often acclaimed as the inventor of the Maltese Cross – whether he is or not is debatable. A German engineer, Max Gliewe, had developed a Maltese Cross gear to repair a faulty Isolatograph projector used in a projection hall, Unter den Linden. Messter struck a deal with Gliewe whereby the engineer's Gliewe & Kügler workshop would supply the Maltese Cross mechanism exclusively to Messter.
By June 1896, Messter had his first order for his new projector – which he called a Thaumatograph – from a Russian gentleman named Rogulin, and the order was shipped on the 15th June. By the end of the year, Messter had sold a further sixty-four machines throughout Europe, and was working in close co-operation with the firm of Bauer & Betz, which he would soon take over..
In the autumn of 1896, having constructed his own camera, Messter began making movies. His first production, Am Brandenburger Tor zu Berlin, was followed by a series of films depicting Berlin street scenes, military parades, sports events, etc., and within a year Messter had a total of 84 films in his catalogue.
On the 21st September, Messter acquired a twice-failed theatre at 21 Unter den Linden in Berlin, which had been exhibiting with an Isolatograph without success since 26th April. Unfortunately for Messter, he had no more luck operating Germany’s first dedicated cinema, now called the 'Biorama,' and the theatre soon closed. Messter’s film projections did become extremely popular as part of vaudeville programmes, however, after he made his first projection at Berlin’s Apollo Variety Theatre on the 1st November.
In the same month in which he gave his first projection, Messter also built a studio on the fifth floor of 94a Friedrichstrasse, and began to make staged movies. Within six months, Messter would become one of the major film manufacturers in Central Europe. [ADD]
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