Bid on the Gallows High

By Matt Wood in News on Oct 18, 2006 4:10PM

How would you like to have an authentic gallows to call your own? The current owner of the old Cook County gallows, Mike Donley of Donley's Wild West Town in northwest-suburban Union, is selling the platform, scaffolding, and hanging beams that helped execute 86 inmates between 1887 and 1927. Donley originally bought the gallows in 1977 when he owned a museum of Chicago artifacts, but lately he has been using them as a prop in his wild west theme park. Now he wants to sell them because they don't seem as appropriate in his kid-friendly attraction.

The Tribune reports that the gallows carry some significant history with them, including being used in the execution of the instigators anarchists who were wrongly accused of starting the Haymarket Riot. They were also used for the last hanging in Cook County in 1927. They might have been destroyed long ago, but officials kept them around after condemned inmate "Terrible Tommy" O'Connor escaped before his execution in 1921. They held on to the gallows to hang O'Connor if he was ever caught, but they languished in a basement in the Cook County Jail until Conley bought them.

Some people are worried that the gallows will be purchased for the wrong reasons by someone obsessed with macabre murder artifacts, though because of its historical attachment to the Haymarket Riot it may attract more reputable bidders. Bidding starts November 20 at Mastro Auctions, so you won't be able to work the gallows into this year's haunted house display, but if you have at least $5,000, maybe you could get them just in time to scare the hell out of your new in-laws when they come over for the holidays.

Image from Mastro Auctions