10.19.2007

This just in 104 years later

From the Hazel Green Herald, January 8, 1903
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"Topsy Executed:Several hundred spectators witnessed the death of the elephant."

Topsy, the first baby elephant ever exhibited in the U.S. killed three men and was sentenced to death via lethal injection of cyanide of potassium. When the poison took too long, the audience was treated to the larger than life spectacle of a 28 year old elephant being electrocuted as 6600 volts traveled up from the copper plates on which she stood. The second attempt succeeded in less than 10 seconds.