Oak by Peter Young

Author:Peter Young
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Reaktion Books

There is a physical basis for the saying in that the oak, large in the landscape, has a low electrical resistance. Hence the blasted oak, stark in silhouette and with a haunting character.

However, this did not stop the wood being the choice for the solid construction of the electric chair, the first of which was used in New York State in 1890. A strong chair was necessary to withstand the effects of the 2,250 volt charges, each normally of three seconds in length, repeated four times within two minutes, sent through the body of the occupant restrained by leather straps. One nickname for the chair was ‘Thunderbolt’. There was a particularly gruesome practice in Florida, where inmates of the state prison made their ‘Old Sparky’ in 1923 after the state legislature designated electrocution the official method of execution in place of hanging. A three-legged replacement was constructed from oak in 1998. Out on a heath in a storm, King Lear cries:

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