The Man Who Cut His Own Rope

New York, 1854. A man in a top hat rides a platform high above a crowd, has the rope cut with an axe, and says "All safe, gentlemen, all safe." That is how the story of Elisha Otis is usually told. The hat, the axe, the crowd and the words are not in the reports from that year. What the record does show is a mechanic whose lifting machines had stopped selling, standing on his own platform and cutting his own rope. This is the story of what kept him up there, and of the idea every lift still rests on: when the rope breaks, something else stops the fall. The 1854 catch, the modern jaws and governor, a seat belt, and three real cases where the ropes did break. Sources for every figure, and for every claim about what the record does and does not contain, are pinned in the comments. Nothing in this film is advice about what to do in a lift. CHAPTERS 0:00 The story as it is usually told 1:07 Luggage rode. People climbed. 1:54 A mechanic and a mousetrap 4:18 Three sold, then nothing 5:13 What the newspapers actually printed 6:52 What cutting the rope won him 9:07 Why the top floor was the cheapest 10:02 Inside the shaft 10:54 The jaws, the thin rope, the wheel 12:59 You already own one 13:45 Where the harm really is 14:38 Three times the ropes broke 17:16 So he showed them THE BORING MACHINE How the machine actually works. #howitworks #elevator #engineering