Stealing electricity has been around since shortly after Thomas Edison founded the Edison Electric Light Company in New York City in 1878. In 1886, for example, the Daily Yellowstone Journal reported that “numerous unprincipled persons had availed themselves of the opportunity to steal electricity” from Edison by tapping into the wires upstream of the electrical meter. The superintendent of the electrical company responded by connecting extra electrical dynamos into the system in an attempt to burn out the illicit coils and motors...
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