Choking with Mirth: Gallows Humor You may have noticed a reprehensible penchant in this blog for light-hearted looks at topics such as self-decapitation, hangman’s ropes, cholera jokes, and unusual methods of execution. Today we sink even further into the mire of inappropriate mirth with a post about gallows humor: period jokes about execution by hanging.
When the state of Colorado decided to reinstitute capital punishment in 1901, a new and improved self-hanging gallows was their execution method of choice.