My maternal grandmother came from Ireland, landing in New York City in
1901.  She recalled that, shortly after she got here, she was thrilled
going to the Nickelette.  Apparently the show consisted of illustrated
song slides accompanied by a piano player and several very short moving
pictures.

My grandfather arrived in New York in 1906 and he, too, referred to the
then movies as "nickelettes".  Apparently they were rather small set-ups
serving the local neighbourhoods in Manhattan, I assume in districts
where folks' entertainment budgets were rather limited -- to a nickel,
I assume.

John Buscemi

 [ On page 109 of the anthology, "The Silent Cinema Reader" (Psychology
 [ Press, 2004 - 423 pages), writer Richard Abel notes that William Fox
 [ established his "Nickelette" in Brooklyn.  Then Abel remarks:
 [
 [ "That the first nickelodeons emerged in the region of the country from
 [ Pittsburgh and Philadelphia west to Chicago strangely coincides with
 [ a relative lack of prior trade press reports on moving picture programs
 [ in vaudeville houses there, almost as if there had been an attempt to
 [ suppress or deny their growing appeal."
 [
 [ Indeed, I found only one mention of "nickelette" in all the Presto and
 [ Music Trade Review journals, but small town newspapers have several
 [ mentions; see, for example,  http://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html 
 [ -- Robbie