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Executioner's Current: Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, and the Invention of the Electric Chair - Softcover

Moran, Richard

 
9780375724466: Executioner's Current: Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, and the Invention of the Electric Chair
Softcover
ISBN 10: 037572446X ISBN 13: 9780375724466
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2003

Synopsis

A "fascinating and provocative" story (The Washington Post) of high stakes competition between two titans that shows how the electric chair developed through an effort by one nineteenth-century electric company to discredit the other.

In 1882, Thomas Edison ushered in the "age of electricity" when he illuminated Manhattan's Pearl Street with his direct current (DC) system. Six years later, George Westinghouse lit up Buffalo with his less expensive alternating current (AC). The two men quickly became locked in a fierce rivalry, made all the more complicated by a novel new application for their product: the electric chair. When Edison set out to persuade the state of New York to use Westinghouse's current to execute condemned criminals, Westinghouse fought back in court, attempting to stop the first electrocution and keep AC from becoming the "executioner's current." In this meticulously researched account of the ensuing legal battle and the horribly botched first execution, Moran raises disturbing questions not only about electrocution, but about about our society's tendency to rely on new technologies to answer moral questions.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Author

RICHARD MORAN is professor of sociology at Mount Holyoke College and the author of Knowing Right from Wrong: The Insanity Defense of Daniel McNaughtan and numerous articles and reviews. He has also served as a commentator for National Public Radio's Morning Edition and written op-eds for the Boston Globe, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, Chicago Tribune, Christian Science Monitor, New York Times, Newsweek, and The Wall Street Journal. He lives in South Hadley, Massachusetts.

From the Back Cover

In this amazing story of high stakes competition between two titans, Richard Moran shows how the electric chair developed not out of the desire to be more humane but through an effort by one nineteenth-century electric company to discredit the other.
In 1882, Thomas Edison ushered in the "age of electricity" when he illuminated Manhattan's Pearl Street with his direct current (DC) system. Six years later, George Westinghouse lit up Buffalo with his less expensive alternating current (AC). The two men quickly became locked in a fierce rivalry, made all the more complicated by a novel new application for their product: the electric chair. When Edison set out to persuade the state of New York to use Westinghouse's current to execute condemned criminals, Westinghouse fought back in court, attempting to stop the first electrocution and keep AC from becoming the "executioner's current." In this meticulously researched account of the ensuing legal battle and the horribly botched first execution, Moran raises disturbing questions not only about electrocution, but about about our society's tendency to rely on new technologies to answer moral questions.

From the Inside Flap

In this amazing story of high stakes competition between two titans, Richard Moran shows how the electric chair developed not out of the desire to be more humane but through an effort by one nineteenth-century electric company to discredit the other.

In 1882, Thomas Edison ushered in the age of electricity when he illuminated Manhattan s Pearl Street with his direct current (DC) system. Six years later, George Westinghouse lit up Buffalo with his less expensive alternating current (AC). The two men quickly became locked in a fierce rivalry, made all the more complicated by a novel new application for their product: the electric chair. When Edison set out to persuade the state of New York to use Westinghouse s current to execute condemned criminals, Westinghouse fought back in court, attempting to stop the first electrocution and keep AC from becoming the executioner s current. In this meticulously researched account of the ensuing legal battle and the horribly botched first execution, Moran raises disturbing questions not only about electrocution, but about about our society s tendency to rely on new technologies to answer moral questions.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Publisher
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date
2003
Language
English
ISBN 10 
037572446X
ISBN 13 
9780375724466
Binding
Paperback
Number of pages
303