McKinley was shot while attending the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. Leon Czolgosz, a Polish citizen associated with the Anarchist movement, fired two shots at McKinley who was greeting the public in a receiving line. McKinley died September 14, whispering the words of his favorite hymn, "Nearer my God to Thee, Nearer to Thee." He was succeeded by his vice president, Theodore Roosevelt.
Czolgosz's execution in an electric chair was reenacted in a short feature shot by Edwin Porter and released, along with films of the World's Fair and the McKinley funeral, by the Edison Company in 1901. Porter began making films for the Edison Company in 1900. He introduced important innovations to the new art of filmmaking including the practice of continuity editing that quickly replaced the earlier technique of stringing together a series of static scenes.
 Execution of Czolgosz, Thomas A. Edison, Inc., 1901. Last Days of a President: McKinley and the World's Fair, 1901 |
- Porter's Panorama of Esplanade by Night uses time-lapse photography to capture a panoramic view of an electrical illumination. Another Porter film, The Martyred Presidents is an unusual tribute to Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, and McKinley. The Edison Company marketed it as a "most valuable ending" to the funeral series.
- Find more Porter films, including footage of McKinley's second inauguration and funeral. Search on Porter in Last Days of a President: McKinley and the World's Fair, 1901.
- See more motion pictures produced by the Edison Company. Visit the collection Inventing Entertainment: The Edison Companies.
- Learn more about the life and death of President William McKinley. See the list of American Memory collections with relevant items for William McKinley in Presidents in American Memory, a feature presentation from the Learning Page.
- Search on the term McKinley in Theodore Roosevelt: His Life and Times to see two 1901 films related to McKinley, footage of his inauguration and his funeral.
