People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 July 1896 — That Bright Smile Was His Last. [ARTICLE]

That Bright Smile Was His Last.

As they led the condemned man from his cell they saw that he was smiling. Even they were binding him in the electric chair the smile lingered on his lips. The curiosity of the warden was aroused. He paused with his thumb gently touching the fatal button and asked the cause of his unseemly mirth. “I—l was just thinkin’," chuckled the malefactor, “how I’m foolin’ my old school teacher. He always said I was born to be hanged.” Then the warden’s thumb came down.