The Delinquent (Vol. IV, No. 2), February, 1914Various
History
The Delinquent (Vol. IV, No. 2), February, 1914
Various
Prisons -- Periodicals
The death house, where is to be placed the first electric chair in
Pennsylvania for the execution of criminals since the passage of the
law providing for the substitution of electrocution for hanging, is to
be a long two-story building, 136 feet in length by 29 feet 4 inches
wide. A cellar under the central portion will contain the heating
apparatus, and on the first floor will be the gasoline engine for
generating the electric current.
But it is on the second story of the severely plain structure of
reinforced concrete and of simple Renaissance type that interest
centers, for here are the cells for the condemned prisoners, rooms for
visitors and the sinister death chamber and post mortem room.
The arrangement is on the corridor plan. To the right, and occupying
nearly half the floor space, are the cell room and cells, six of the
latter, 7 by 9 feet in size, being arranged in a row at the back of the
building facing on a well-lighted room and separated from the rear wall
by what is known as a “pipe corridor.” At the end of the row is a bath
room, and beyond this a room for visitors, opening into the cell room
through a gate protected by a grille.
Beyond the visitors’ room is a room known as the “Lock,” access to
which is had from the first floor by means of a curved stairway, and
opening into a sort of antechamber to the cell room through a gateway
and steel door. It may be said that all of the gates, grilles and metal
doors in the building are to be of “tool-proof” steel.
On the other side of the ante-chamber is the apparatus room, where the
rheostats and other electrical devices will be placed and where the
assistants of the chief electrician will be stationed during executions.
Through a solid wood door, in contradistinction to the steel doors used
elsewhere, entrance is given into the death chamber, which will be a
spacious room, 26 by 29 feet, lighted by six windows, three on each
side, all, of course, heavily barred. The door is near the front wall
of the building, and that sinister piece of furniture, the death chair,
is close to the door on the right. Behind and to the one side of it is
the electrical wall cabinet, at which the electrician stands, watching
the signals given by the physician in charge of the electrocution.
Running nearly around the other three sides of the room are benches for
the witnesses required by law.
The last room on the floor, into which a door opens directly from the
electrocution chamber, is the post mortem room, 19 by 26 feet 8 inches
in size, and equipped with two operating tables, one of soapstone, the
other covered with rubber.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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