It all started when Leland Stanford , a railroad baron and future university founder got curious about the sequence of footfall of a horse. Especially when a hose is at gallop. His main curiosity was to find out if there was moment mid-stride where horses had all hooves off the ground. He approached Mr  Eadweard Muybridge to help him answer his question. Noted photographer, Eadweard Muybridge was hired, in 1872 an they both started working on the project. Something that a child can do today took several years then but Muybridge finally delivered by having captured a horse, named "Sallie Gardner," owned by Stanford; running at a 1:40 gait over the Palo Alto track, on 19th June 1878. Muybridge had to use a dozen cameras all triggered one after another with a set of strings.