• bulwark@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    53
    ·
    29 days ago

    So you’re saying he invented the electric car right? jk. Edison, probably would have creamed his pants for an opportunity to create a government position to eliminate his competitors.

  • owenfromcanada@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    31
    ·
    29 days ago

    If I see a headline that Elon is driving other companies’ cars into elephants to try to show how dangerous other cars are, I’ll have to check to see if it’s an onion article.

    It probably won’t be.

    • turmacar@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      9
      ·
      29 days ago

      Topsy was electrocuted at the request of the ASPCA because they deemed it more humane than just giving her a bunch of cyanide and hanging her.

      Edison Studios, which has about as much relation to the man as Tesla Motors Inc. does their namesake, filmed the event.

      The War of the Currents was a decade previous and between Edison and Westinghouse.

      Edison and Tesla wrote each other friendly letters and spoke well of each other in public.

      Tesla has such a weird reputation. Entertainment is not history.

    • meeeeetch@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      19
      ·
      29 days ago

      Remember when the ADL complimented him as ‘the Henry Ford of our day’, and then walked it back as organization members pointed out that side of Ford’s legacy and then he spent the next few years proving those folks extremely right?

    • thefartographer@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      18
      ·
      29 days ago

      No, PT Barnum was at least entertaining. Sure, he just wanted to take your money, but he didn’t kill people in the process and you got a pretty reasonable value for paying admission.

      • ✺roguetrick✺@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        9
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        29 days ago

        He was mostly lucky in that regard. The amount of fires Barnum had with only animals dying and not people is pretty impressive. He had at least five buildings burn down alone. One of his fires at the American museum had a nice effect due to the cold weather in New York at the time.

        It took a while after his death before one of the big top shows really went up in smoke with significant loss of life.

        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hartford_circus_fire

        • thefartographer@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          28 days ago

          If I’ve learned anything from your elaboration, it’s that I should vote for an arsonist, but only if they burn things for insurance money rather than murder.

          On a more serious note, the first fire alarm boxes weren’t invented until Barnum was 42, and still took some time to spread from Boston. Places weren’t super-well equipped to deal with normal fires, much less ones that started in places filled with hay, dust, paint, paper, and dyed cloth.