Whipping Post
1935-1942
Edward L. Loper presents a biting social critique in this design, depicting a wooden whipping post ominously labeled 'Delaware's Justice.' The scene is populated by stiff, almost toy-like figures: two prisoners are locked in stocks at the top, while a shirtless man is chained to the central post below, awaiting the lash held by a bowler-hatted official. By rendering these brutal figures with a naive, folk-art aesthetic, Loper highlights the absurdity and cruelty of a penal system that clung to corporal punishment long after the rest of the country moved on—Delaware didn't abolish the whipping post until 1972! It’s a powerful, unsettling look at a dark chapter in American legal history.