Edison phonograph. Prominent Frenchmen including Jules Janssen, who made the first film recording of the transit of Venus, testing an Edison phonograph in April 1889. The phonograph was invented in 1877 by Thomas Alva Edison (1847- 1931). It was an early device for making and playing sound recordings. A cylinder wrapped in tin foil was rotated, powered in this case by a Grenet (potassium bichromate) battery, as a vibrating needle made etchings according to the sound received. These could then be played back in a similar way. The phonograph caused a sensation at the Universal Exposition in Paris, 1889, where recordings were made of the guests.