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Chair, The

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Over 4,000 US prisoners to date have ended their walk down death row at the electric chair. Secret History reveals its bloody and disreputable origins.

In 1880 two men, Edison and Westinghouse, were battling to provide electricity to America. Edison’s system was low-voltage and dependable, Westinghouse’s was unpredictable and potentially deadly. Edison volunteered his rival’s alternating-current system to power the first-ever electric chair – ensuring Westinghouse would both foot the bill and field the negative publicity. Regrettably, the current’s voltage had been overrated and the convict’s death was not instantaneous. Secret History’s reconstruction of the electric chair’s first use, is certainly not for the squeamish.

Programme Information

  • Genre: History

  • Subgenre: Factual

  • Producers: RDF Productions

  • Broadcaster: n/a

  • Duration: 1 x 60'

  • Tags: Crime History Factual

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