Description
Championed by Thomas A. Edison, direct current (DC) was the dominant form of electrical current until Tesla, an Edison protégé, and George Westinghouse began a serious push for adoption of alternating current (AC). Sensing a threat to his highly-lucrative DC-based power business, Edison started a campaign to smear AC. He distributed propaganda proclaiming that AC was more hazardous, and even staged public electrocutions of animals using the competing form of current to convince people that they would be bringing something deadly into their homes.
