The elephant executed by electrocution in 1903 was Topsy. She was a female Asian elephant killed at Luna Park on Coney Island, New York, on January 4, 1903.
Topsy had been associated with the Forepaugh Circus and later became part of the Coney Island amusement-park operation. After several incidents, park owners announced plans to kill her publicly. The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals opposed a public hanging, and a combined method involving poison, electrocution, and strangulation was arranged.
Topsy was fed carrots containing potassium cyanide and fitted with copper-lined sandals connected to electrical lines. A 6,600-volt alternating-current charge was sent through her body for about 10 seconds. Contemporary accounts and later summaries identify electrocution as the fatal method, although strangling ropes were also used.
The event was filmed by the Edison Manufacturing Company in a 74-second actuality film titled Electrocuting an Elephant. A persistent myth says Thomas Edison personally staged it to attack alternating current, but the execution occurred years after the so-called War of the Currents, and Edison was not present.