The Last Gasp: The Rise and Fall of the American Gas ChamberThe Last Gasp takes us to the dark side of human history in the first full chronicle of the gas chamber in the United States. In page-turning detail, award-winning writer Scott Christianson tells a dreadful story that is full of surprising and provocative new findings. First constructed in Nevada in 1924, the gas chamber, a method of killing sealed off and removed from the sight and hearing of witnesses, was originally touted as a "humane" method of execution. Delving into science, war, industry, medicine, law, and politics, Christianson overturns this mythology for good. He exposes the sinister links between corporations looking for profit, the military, and the first uses of the gas chamber after World War I. He explores little-known connections between the gas chamber and the eugenics movement. Perhaps most controversially, he has unearthed new evidence about American and German collaboration in the production and lethal use of hydrogen cyanide and about Hitler’s adoption of gas chamber technology developed in the United States. More than a book about the death penalty, this compelling history ultimately reveals much about America’s values and power structures in the twentieth century. |
Contents
Envisioning the Lethal Chamber | |
Fashioning a Frightful Weapon of | |
Devising Constructive Peacetime Uses | |
Staging the Worlds First Gas Execution | |
Like Watering Flowers | |
Pillar of Respectability | |
The Rising Storm | |
Clouds of Abolition | |
The Battle over Capital Punishment | |
Cruel and Unusual Punishment? | 8 |
The Last Gasp | 24 |
Persons Executed by Lethal Gas in the United States by State 19241999 | 33 |
Notes | 49 |
| 1954 | |
Index | 1988 |
Other editions - View all
The Last Gasp: The Rise and Fall of the American Gas Chamber Scott Christianson Limited preview - 2010 |
The Last Gasp: The Rise and Fall of the American Gas Chamber Scott Christianson No preview available - 2011 |
Common terms and phrases
American Cyanamid April Archives Arizona Auschwitz Black MO Black Murder Black NC California capital punishment carbon Carson City cell Chemical Warfare Chemical Warfare Service chemists Chessman Colorado Company condemned convicted crime criminal cruel and unusual cyanide gas death camps death house death penalty death row DEGESCH DuPont electric chair electrocution Eugenics euthanasia execution by lethal executioner extermination February Fierro Fries fumigation gas chamber gas-chamber gases gassing Genocide German Governor Harris History Hitler Holocaust human hydrocyanic acid hydrogen cyanide IG Farben January Jewish Jews John Justice killing later lethal chamber lethal gas lethal gas execution lethal injection Leuchter manufacture McCloy method of execution National Nazi Nevada North Carolina officials painless poison gas political prison Rape Rape/murder Report Robert Roessler & Hasslacher San Quentin sentenced U.S. Supreme Court United University Press valve Warden White Murder White NC White Robbery/murder William witnesses World York Zyklon Zyklon-B