Forty-seven people, forty-six male and one female, were executed in the United States in 1962, twenty-nine by electrocution, fifteen by gas chamber, and three by hanging.
The state of Iowa would conduct its final executions before abolishing capital punishment in 1965. New Jersey would carry out its last involuntary execution, with the last overall occurring the following year. Elizabeth Ann Duncan was the last woman executed before the ruling of Furman v. Georgia, and would be the last woman executed in the United States until 1984.
Herbert Bradley became the last person to be executed in the United States for a robbery that did not result in the victim's death. The victim was left permanently crippled from the waist down after being shot six times and beaten with a hammer, but did not die. Rudolph Wright became the last person to be executed in the United States for assault. After murdering a fellow inmate while serving a life sentence, Wright received a life sentence for first degree murder and a mandatory death sentence for assault with a deadly weapon by an inmate serving a life sentence.
Elmo Lee Smith was the last inmate to be executed by the electric chair in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The state would switch to lethal injection in 1990.