A Career of Crime
A Career of Crime is an American Mutoscope film series made in New York City in 1900.[1][2] The film series includes No. 1: Start in Life; No. 2: Going the Pace; No. 3: Robbery & Murder; No. 4: In the Toils[3] and part 5, Death in the Electric Chair. It was marketed with an electric chair and depicts its use in carrying out the death penalty.[4] It was filmed in New York City and depicts an execution at Sing Sing Prison. It is part of a film series.[3] Arthur Marvin was the cinematographer.[5]
The Library of Congress listed it with a copyright year of 1902.[6] In 1907, a Billboard advertisement offered it and reels for Execution of a Spy and The Wizard and the Model.[7]
It succeeded the American Mutoscope & Biograph Company film An Execution by Hanging, a movie filmed in a Jacksonville, Florida prison in 1898 that was the first motion picture to depict an execution.[8]
The Smithsonian has an advertisement for Death in the Electric Chair at Sing Sing.[8] The George Eastman Museum has the mutoscope for the film but it is in poor condition and missing its hub.[9] In 2022 a Mutoscope with the film reel was auctioned.[10]
References
[edit]- ^ Griffiths, Alison (2016). Carceral Fantasies: Cinema and Prison in Early Twentieth-Century America. Columbia University Press. p. 24. doi:10.7312/grif16106. ISBN 978-0-231-54156-5. OCLC 954133810. Partial preview at Google Books.
- ^ Griffiths, Alison (2014-05-01). "Tableaux Morts: Execution, Cinema, and Galvanistic Fantasies". Republics of Letters. 3 (3). Stanford University: 10–11. Retrieved 2024-07-07.
- ^ a b "AFI|Catalog". catalog.afi.com.
- ^ Richard E. Norman and Race Filmmaking. Indiana University Press. 8 November 2013. ISBN 978-0-253-01072-8.
- ^ Spehr, Paul C. (1980). "Filmmaking at the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company 1900—1906". The Quarterly Journal of the Library of Congress. 37 (3/4). Library of Congress: 413–421. ISSN 0041-7939. JSTOR 29781869. OCLC 9975276040. Retrieved 2024-07-07.
- ^ Walls, Howard Lemarr; Library of Congress Copyright Office (1953). Motion pictures, 1894-1912: identified from records of Copyright Office. p. 10. OCLC 1034546921 – via Internet Archive.
- ^ "Billboard Music Week". Billboard Publications. March 22, 1907 – via Google Books.
- ^ a b Institution, Smithsonian. ""Death in the Electric Chair at Sing Sing" Mutoscope Movie Poster". Smithsonian Institution.
- ^ "Subject 7654: "Electric Chair at Sing Sing" (TMS 1974.0023.0083), undated | George Eastman Museum".
- ^ "Lot Detail - CAST IRON MUTOSCOPE". auctions.morphyauctions.com.
