Former site of the Cosmograph Company

They called him the Utility Man.

It’s maybe too simple a description for the man who brought this eastern Kentucky community into the 20th century. Edward Maggard was beloved for bringing Morehead residents the luxuries of modern life — electricity, phone service, water, and, possibly the most exciting of them all, the movies.

Maggard, an inventor, businessman and entrepreneur, moved to Morehead from Sandy Hook in 1903 and founded Morehead Light Company, bringing light into the homes of the city’s 450 residents.

Connecting Morehead by phone was his next adventure. Maggard established Morehead Telephone Company in 1919, stringing telephone wires that carried voice signals across the community and enabling conversation between residents who were located miles apart.

He added water and gas services to the community in 1922, and later founded the county’s first ice plant.

But it was a short movie Maggard produced about Morehead for the state legislature that played a pivotal role in making this community the regional economic center it would later become. Maggard’s film swayed legislators to locate a college here.

Maggard opened the first theater in Morehead following that successful film. First located on Bishop Avenue and later in the Cozy Building on Main Street, Maggard showed his first silent movie accompanied by piano — called a nickelodeon — using Edison’s original projector. The projector produced a disturbing flicker on screen that inspired Maggard to invent his own shutter. He patented his design and opened a projector factory on this site. The projector, called the Cosmograph, was popular for several years before sound projectors made an appearance. One of Maggard’s Cosmographs is on display at the Morehead History and Railroad Museum.