Old Smokey

New Jersey

New Jersey's Old Smokey is on display at the New Jersey State Police Museum. The chair's most notorious target was Richard Hauptmann, the man behind the Lindbergh kidnapping.

The chair at the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton was used in the electrocution of 159 men for capital punishment in New Jersey, starting with Saverio DiGiovanni on December 11, 1907, and ending with Ralph Hudson on January 22, 1963, which also was the final execution carried out in New Jersey. Hauptmann was executed on April 3, 1936.

After the death penalty was abolished nationwide in 1972 following Furman v. Georgia, the chair was moved to storage and the chamber was converted to a visitor center. In the 1980s, the chair was put on exhibit at the now-defunct Capital Punishment Museum, housed in a building at the New Jersey State Corrections Academy; the chair was sent to the New Jersey State Museum and later was transferred to the New Jersey State Police Museum in Ewing Township, where it remains on display. New Jersey abandoned electrocution in favor of lethal injection in 1983, then abolished capital punishment altogether in 2007.

Pennsylvania

The Pennsylvania electric chair was used in the electrocution of 348 men and two women for capital punishment in Pennsylvania at what is now SCI Rockview, and ending with the execution of Elmo Smith on April 2, 1962.

The chair was placed into storage in 1971 and reassembled in 1985, but never was used again after Pennsylvania abolished electrocution in 1990 as an execution method, in favor of lethal injection. It is stored at the State Museum of Pennsylvania, and has never been displayed.

Tennessee

The electric chair at the Tennessee State Prison in Nashville also was nicknamed "Old Smokey", and was used to execute 125 people for capital punishment in Tennessee between July 13, 1916 (Julius Morgan) and November 7, 1960 (William Tines).

After switching its primary method of execution to lethal injection in 2000, Tennessee has given prisoners sentenced to capital punishment before then a choice between lethal injection or electrocution; the chair was moved to Riverbend Maximum Security Institution and refurbished by Fred A. Leuchter. In 2014, Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam signed a bill making the electric chair a backup method of execution if the drugs used in a lethal injection are not available.

After the original chair was removed, it was put on display at the National Museum of Crime and Punishment in Washington D.C., where it was until it and everything else there got moved to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee for the Alcatraz East Crime Museum, where it resides today.

Since the chair was refurbished, Tennessee has executed six prisoners by electrocution:

• Daryl Holton (September 12, 2007)
• Edmund Zagorski (November 1, 2018)
• David Earl Miller (December 6, 2018)
• Stephen Michael West (August 15, 2019)
• Lee Hall (December 5, 2019)
• Nicholas Todd Sutton (February 20, 2020)

References

References

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5. (December 5, 1976). "Last Execution in Jersey took Life of Murderer Who Didn't Want to Live". The New York Times.
6. Waldron, Martin. (July 25, 1976). "A Matter Of Life Or Death". The New York Times.
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11. (June 16, 1983). "The New Jersey Senate passed a law Thursday that would make lethal injection the method for carrying out the state's death penalty". UPI Archives.
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14. (December 17, 2007). "New Jersey Abolishes Death Penalty". NPR.
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19. Hunn, Andy. (December 3, 1990). "Rockview to end electric chair use". PSU Collegian.
20. (March 13, 1983). "Inmate Ronald Harries May Force Death Penalty Decision". The Tennessean.
21. (July 13, 1916). "Death chair's first victim". The Tennessean.
22. (August 9, 2018). "Last East TN man to be executed was convicted of rape in 1957". 10 News WBIR.
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24. Hale, Steven. (July 7, 2016). "The Chair: 100 Years After Its First Use, Tennessee's Electric Chair Remains the State's Most Prolific Killer". Nashville Scene.
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32. Rojas, Rick. (February 19, 2020). "why This Inmate Chose the Electric Chair Over Lethal Injection". The New York Times.