The Elephant Series

Three young circus elephants were unjustly killed - murdered? - during the 31 years between 1885 and 1916. Why? The short answer to "Why?" is that humans with the power of life and death were blinded by self-serving ambition and their acceptance of cruel treatment of wild animals. The freakish, grotesque deaths of three elephants stand as beacons of man's cruelty toward our animal friends, a cruelty that presages man's cruelty toward each other...cruelty that a more compassionate society can and should relegate to the deepest depths of history. Is that too much to ask?

Tom Edison and George Westinghouse battled for years over which type of electricity would be the worldwide standard. The Current War incited Tom to electrocute a six-ton elephant named Topsy. It's 1904. Edison is on trial for Topsy's premeditated murder a year earlier. In an unusual legal maneuver, Westinghouse assumed the state's prerogative by retaining the prosecutor, Bourke Cockran, a wealthy Manhattan attorney, federal Congressman, and a mainstay in the Democratic Party.

Based on real events perpetrated by real people, Who Murdered Mary? is a gripping tale of shortsighted decisions, heartless animal cruelty, and needless murder of an innocent circus elephant that was aided and abetted by mob rule and officials of a prosperous railroad. The tale unfolded during three tumultuous days in September 1916 in the peaceful but ill-fated towns of Kingsport, Johnson City, and Erwin, Tennessee.