BACK OFF.

I can see more people are getting linked to this from SlashDot(<3 /.) and the attention isn't all good.

The facts:
-Topsy was an elephant who was used for labor, to help build Luna Park on Coney Island. Still a very popular place.
-Topsy KILLED *3* PEOPLE.
-Topsy was sentenced to the death penalty by NY state superior court.
-Thomas Edison, a well educated man, who we owe nearly everything around us to his hard work and dedication to helping society and the world as a whole, was at the time promoting a "safer and more efficient" DC power, and had been traveling the nation and doing executions on *SICK AND STRAY CATS AND DOGS AND RATS* to demonstrate the dangers of AC power.
-At the time this film was made, 1903, nothing like this had ever been attempted before, and to not get it on film for documentary/historic purposes would have been a sin.


Just HOW DO YOU EXECUTE AN ELEPHANT?

You can't shoot it... because you can't pierce its extremely thing hide, unless you used an artillery cannon, but that would not only be most likely ineffective, entire inhumane... and messy.

You can't use dynamite.. that's effective but entirely not practical. Not even in 1903 could that be remotely considered humane... I guess unless it was so much that it never stood a chance. But that's neither here nor there.

You can't push the damn thing off a cliff or drown it or suffocate it or gas it. We didn't have the means to do any of those things, and the longer the animal stayed alive and in captivity, the greater the risk of it taking OTHER HUMAN LIVES.

One of the most humane(so they say) methods of execution for a long time has been electrocution. Yeah it's pretty brutal, and if I had the choice, I'd choose firing squad for myself most likely.

But anyway, AC power was powerful enough to get the job done and it was about the only "humane" means of executing an animal this large at that point in time.

Anything else would cause the animal pain and suffering, this method of execution, the animal most likely didn't feel the pain because of the electricity surging through its body. Now, actions speak louder than words, I realize, and it may appear as though the elephant was in excruiciating pain before it collapsed, however, it's unlikely it would have felt more than a pain like it stepped on a hot coal or intense burning where the electrodes were connected to its body. Beyond that the brain would have too much electricity in it to really make it all that possible to feel or control itself.

I realize this seems like I'm winging it and not calling many facts up, but it is 5 in the morning, afterall.

Moving along...

My opinion. this happend 103 years ago. The animal is long since dead, it was an animal, it took the lives of *THREE* *human beings*... it may very well have demolished a family by taking away kids' fathers, widowing wives, taking away the only form of income for a family. Versus an elephant.

Don't get me wrong, I love animals. But honestly this was over 100 years ago! Things have changed a LOT. (Though, don't think putting animals down/to sleep is entirely humane and painless... if a certain reaction occurs to the drugs used, it can cause EXCRUCIATING pain to the animal(or even human) if the subject is not completely sedated before the lethal drugs are injected.

So just cool your jets, and don't watch it.
We've got plenty more *beep* for you to go hurly guts over...

Faces of Death, beheading videos, war videos, tortures, executions, accidents, pictures, videos, sound clips... you name it, it's basicly out there.
The world is a *beep* up place. Welcome to real life.

PS: Thomas Edison was a great person. The fact that he was chosen by the state of New York to perform this execution and experiment does not make him "scum" or anything, nor does the fact that he accepted the job and carried it out successfully. Thomas Edison did more for this world than you could even begin to IMAGINE anybody being able to do. If someone had to go and bring air to this planet for everything to breathe and use, a man like Thomas Edison would have been the man to do it. He lit this planet, he saved billions of lives, every single day, and night, you interact all around you, conscious or not, willfully or not, with his inventions. If there is a god, may it bless Edison's soul.. if he has one. Whatever. Just lay off the Edison bashing.