July 27: The inventor William Ensign Lincoln applied for a U.S. patent for his zoetrope,[1] as an assignor to the board gamemanufacturing companyMilton Bradley and Co.. The patent was granted to him in April 1867.[2] Lincoln had invented the definitive version of the zoetrope in 1865, when he was about 18 years old and a sophomore at the Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. Lincoln's patented version had the viewing slits on a level above the pictures, which allowed the use of easily replaceable strips of images. It also had an illustrated paper disc on the base, which was not always exploited on the commercially produced versions. On the advice of a local bookstore owner, Lincoln had sent a model to Milton Bradley and Co. in an attempt to market the animation device. [3]
December: The zoetrope is advertised in American newspapers by various shop owners.[4]
Specific date unknown:
The photographer William Pumphrey organised an exhibition of Yorkshire Fine Art and Industry, in the grounds of the Bootham Park Hospital. Pumphrey himself introduced an exhibit of two revolving stereoscopes, each containing 50 of his stereo views.[5]
April 23: Willie Riley, English novelist, (Riley had a career in the sale of magic lantern slides and relevant equipment until 1914, when, with the onset of World War I, his family's company failed. Riley then developed a second career as a professional writer), (d. 1961).[8]: 50–51, 108–109 [9][10]
November 22: Anna Caulfield McKnight, American traveler, lecturer on art and travel, and businesswoman, (her lectures used magic lantern slides which were taken on her travels, and made her a well-known lecturer in her time), (d. 1947).[11][12]
^Griggs, Debbie D. (1992). "Projection Apparatus for Science in Late Nineteenth Century America". Rittenhouse: The Journal of the American Scientific Instrument Enterprise. 7: 9–15. OCLC191236874.
^"Anna Caulfield McKnight", Woman's Who's who of America, A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada, 1914-1915, ed. John William Leonard, New York: The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p. 525