This is an approximately 35-second long Lumière Brothers actuality that shows the 25th President of the United States, William McKinley, at home in Ohio. As you might expect in a Lumière Brothers short, McKinley walks at an oblique angle from the front of his house to a planter in the front yard, then out of frame. An unidentified man walks with McKinley on his right hand side. At about mid-frame, just to the side of the planter, they stop, the man hands McKinley a paper, he puts on a top hat, he writes something on the paper, hands the paper back to the man, removes his hat, and they walk out of the frame.
Depending on how you look at it, McKinley was either the first or second President to appear on film. The ambiguity rests on a couple technicalities. President McKinley at Home was actually filmed in 1896, when McKinley was campaigning for his first term--the actuality was probably taken during one of McKinley's famed "Front Porch" publicity events. Afterwards, another actuality was shot at McKinley's first inauguration in March 4, 1897, but Grover Cleveland, the 22nd and 24th U.S. President (he served two non-consecutive terms) was filmed first--he attended McKinley's inauguration. So Cleveland was captured on film as President moments before McKinley was captured on film as President.
This short is not the most fascinating Lumière Brothers work from an artistic standpoint, but of course it is of historical value. It's interesting to note how conscious of the camera McKinley and his companion are--they hardly take their eyes off of it while they're walking. Like many other Lumière "documentaries", it's intriguing just how clearly this scene was staged. McKinley and his companion stop just to the side of the planter as if they're hitting a mark. Their gait is very deliberate, as if timed to last the length of the film before they exit the frame. McKinley carefully places his hat on his head and takes it back off, as if to offer different "looks" for photographs.
Although McKinley may not have been the first President captured on film, he's certainly the first President for whom film captured many important moments, including scenes from the Pan-American Exhibition in Buffalo, New York, where McKinley was assassinated in 1901 at the beginning of his second term (although film of the assassination itself does not exist). Most of the McKinley films were produced by the Edison Manufacturing Company.