True Crime of the Day

True Crime of the Day 


On August 6, 1890, at Auburn Prison in New York, convicted murdrer William Kemmler became the first person to be executed by electric chair. The idea of execution by electrocution originated in 1881 with dentist Albert Southwick, who witnessed a drunk man touch an electric generator and die "painlessly." New York's Electrical Execution Law was passed in 1889. The theory was that electrocution provided a quicker and more painless death than hanging--the most common method of execution prior to the law's passing--which could take up to 30 minute.

The Auburn Prison electrician designed the first chair with two electrodes that were covered with wet sponges and attached to the condemned person's head and back. It too two shocks to kill Kemmler--one at 700 volts for 17 seconds and the second at 1,030 volts for 2 minutes. Southwick stood by his hypothesis that this was a kinder method of execution, stating, "We live in a higher civilization from this day on." Electric power pioneer George Westinghouse disagreed, countering, "They would have done better with an axe."

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