Electric Chair

Since its first use in 1890, the electric chair has been the means of legal execution for over 4,300 individuals in 23 states. Its use in recent years has steadily declined, and nowadays many states use the chair only as a museum display. This book provides a history of the electric chair and analyzes its features, its development, and the manner of its use. Chapters cover the early conceptual stages as a humane alternative to hanging, and the rivalry between Edison and Westinghouse that was one of the main forces in the chair's adoption as a mode of execution. Also presented are an account of the terrible first execution and a number of the subsequent gruesome employments of the chair. The text explores the changing attitudes toward the chair as state after state replaces it with lethal injection.