Invented by a dentist and developed with the support of Thomas Edison as an alternative to hanging in the 1880s, the electric chair has killed more than 4,300 people in its 110-year history.
Timeline Victims
Book
A shocking invention
Once used in half the states, it has been replaced with lethal injection in all but a few. This page, and the book from which it was adapted, tells the strange history of this gruesome death device.