On May 13, 1898, Thomas Edison sued the American Mutoscope Company, claiming they infringed on his patent for the Kinetograph movie camera. One of the founders of Mutoscope was a former employee. The courts handed down a mixed decision. Many inventors had worked on movie cameras, and the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that Edison did not invent the motion-picture camera, but allowed that he had invented the sprocket system that moved perforated film through the camera.
