diff --git a/Lib/test/test_signal.py b/Lib/test/test_signal.py
index b88565c..76574af 100644
--- a/Lib/test/test_signal.py
+++ b/Lib/test/test_signal.py
@@ -1,6 +1,10 @@
 import unittest
 from test import test_support
+from contextlib import closing, nested
+import pickle
+import select
 import signal
+import traceback
 import sys, os, time, errno
 
 if sys.platform[:3] in ('win', 'os2') or sys.platform == 'riscos':
@@ -11,39 +15,20 @@
 class HandlerBCalled(Exception):
     pass
 
+
+def exit_subprocess():
+    """Use os._exit(0) to exit the current subprocess.
+
+    Otherwise, the test catches the SystemExit and continues executing
+    in parallel with the original test, so you wind up with an
+    exponential number of tests running concurrently.
+    """
+    os._exit(0)
+
+
 class InterProcessSignalTests(unittest.TestCase):
     MAX_DURATION = 20   # Entire test should last at most 20 sec.
 
-    # Set up a child to send signals to us (the parent) after waiting
-    # long enough to receive the alarm.  It seems we miss the alarm
-    # for some reason.  This will hopefully stop the hangs on
-    # Tru64/Alpha.  Alas, it doesn't.  Tru64 appears to miss all the
-    # signals at times, or seemingly random subsets of them, and
-    # nothing done in force_test_exit so far has actually helped.
-    def spawn_force_test_exit_process(self, parent_pid):
-        # Sigh, both imports seem necessary to avoid errors.
-        import os
-        fork_pid = os.fork()
-        if fork_pid:
-            # In parent.
-            return fork_pid
-
-        # In child.
-        import os, time
-        try:
-            # Wait 5 seconds longer than the expected alarm to give enough
-            # time for the normal sequence of events to occur.  This is
-            # just a stop-gap to try to prevent the test from hanging.
-            time.sleep(self.MAX_DURATION + 5)
-            print >> sys.__stdout__, "  child should not have to kill parent"
-            for signame in "SIGHUP", "SIGUSR1", "SIGUSR2", "SIGALRM":
-                os.kill(parent_pid, getattr(signal, signame))
-                print >> sys.__stdout__, "    child sent", signame, "to", \
-                      parent_pid
-                time.sleep(1)
-        finally:
-            os._exit(0)
-
     def handlerA(self, *args):
         self.a_called = True
         if test_support.verbose:
@@ -55,121 +40,144 @@
             print "handlerB invoked", args
         raise HandlerBCalled(*args)
 
-    def test_main(self):
-        self.assertEquals(signal.getsignal(signal.SIGHUP), self.handlerA)
-        self.assertEquals(signal.getsignal(signal.SIGUSR1), self.handlerB)
-        self.assertEquals(signal.getsignal(signal.SIGUSR2), signal.SIG_IGN)
-        self.assertEquals(signal.getsignal(signal.SIGALRM),
-                          signal.default_int_handler)
+    def wait(self, child_pid):
+        """Wait for child_pid to finish, ignoring EINTR."""
+        while True:
+            try:
+                pid, status = os.waitpid(child_pid, 0)
+                return status
+            except OSError as e:
+                if e.errno != errno.EINTR:
+                    raise
 
-        # Launch an external script to send us signals.
-        # We expect the external script to:
-        #    send HUP, which invokes handlerA to set a_called
-        #    send USR1, which invokes handlerB to set b_called and raise
-        #               HandlerBCalled
-        #    send USR2, which is ignored
-        #
-        # Then we expect the alarm to go off, and its handler raises
-        # KeyboardInterrupt, finally getting us out of the loop.
+    def run_test(self):
+        # Install handlers. This function runs in a sub-process, so we
+        # don't worry about re-setting the default handlers.
+        signal.signal(signal.SIGHUP, self.handlerA)
+        signal.signal(signal.SIGUSR1, self.handlerB)
+        signal.signal(signal.SIGUSR2, signal.SIG_IGN)
+        signal.signal(signal.SIGALRM, signal.default_int_handler)
 
-        if test_support.verbose:
-            verboseflag = '-x'
-        else:
-            verboseflag = '+x'
+        # Variables the signals will modify:
+        self.a_called = False
+        self.b_called = False
 
-        pid = self.pid
+        # Let the sub-processes know who to send signals to.
+        pid = os.getpid()
         if test_support.verbose:
             print "test runner's pid is", pid
 
-        # Shell script that will send us asynchronous signals
-        script = """
-         (
-                set %(verboseflag)s
-                sleep 2
-                kill -HUP %(pid)d
-                sleep 2
-                kill -USR1 %(pid)d
-                sleep 2
-                kill -USR2 %(pid)d
-         ) &
-        """ % vars()
+        child = os.fork()
+        if child == 0:
+            os.kill(pid, signal.SIGHUP)
+            exit_subprocess()
+        self.wait(child)
+        self.assertTrue(self.a_called)
+        self.assertFalse(self.b_called)
+        self.a_called = False
 
-        signal.alarm(self.MAX_DURATION)
-
-        handler_b_exception_raised = False
-
-        os.system(script)
         try:
+            child = os.fork()
+            if child == 0:
+                os.kill(pid, signal.SIGUSR1)
+                exit_subprocess()
+            # This wait should be interrupted by the signal's exception.
+            self.wait(child)
+            self.fail('HandlerBCalled exception not thrown')
+        except HandlerBCalled:
+            # So we call it again to reap the child's zombie.
+            self.wait(child)
+            self.assertTrue(self.b_called)
+            self.assertFalse(self.a_called)
             if test_support.verbose:
-                print "starting pause() loop..."
-            while 1:
-                try:
-                    if test_support.verbose:
-                        print "call pause()..."
-                    signal.pause()
-                    if test_support.verbose:
-                        print "pause() returned"
-                except HandlerBCalled:
-                    handler_b_exception_raised = True
-                    if test_support.verbose:
-                        print "HandlerBCalled exception caught"
+                print "HandlerBCalled exception caught"
 
+        child = os.fork()
+        if child == 0:
+            os.kill(pid, signal.SIGUSR2)
+            exit_subprocess()
+        self.wait(child)  # Nothing should happen.
+
+        try:
+            signal.alarm(1)
+            # The race condition in pause doesn't matter in this case,
+            # since alarm is going to raise a KeyboardException, which
+            # will skip the call.
+            signal.pause()
         except KeyboardInterrupt:
             if test_support.verbose:
                 print "KeyboardInterrupt (the alarm() went off)"
-
-        self.assert_(self.a_called)
-        self.assert_(self.b_called)
-        self.assert_(handler_b_exception_raised)
-
-    def setUp(self):
-        # Install handlers.
-        self.hup = signal.signal(signal.SIGHUP, self.handlerA)
-        self.usr1 = signal.signal(signal.SIGUSR1, self.handlerB)
-        self.usr2 = signal.signal(signal.SIGUSR2, signal.SIG_IGN)
-        self.alrm = signal.signal(signal.SIGALRM,
-                                  signal.default_int_handler)
-        self.a_called = False
-        self.b_called = False
-        self.pid = os.getpid()
-        self.fork_pid = self.spawn_force_test_exit_process(self.pid)
-
-    def tearDown(self):
-        # Forcibly kill the child we created to ping us if there was a
-        # test error.
-        try:
-            # Make sure we don't kill ourself if there was a fork
-            # error.
-            if self.fork_pid > 0:
-                os.kill(self.fork_pid, signal.SIGKILL)
         except:
-            # If the child killed us, it has probably exited.  Killing
-            # a non-existent process will raise an error which we
-            # don't care about.
-            pass
+            self.fail('Some other exception woke us from pause: %s' %
+                      traceback.format_exc())
+        else:
+            self.fail('pause returned of its own accord')
 
-        # Restore handlers.
-        signal.alarm(0) # cancel alarm in case we died early
-        signal.signal(signal.SIGHUP, self.hup)
-        signal.signal(signal.SIGUSR1, self.usr1)
-        signal.signal(signal.SIGUSR2, self.usr2)
-        signal.signal(signal.SIGALRM, self.alrm)
+    def test_main(self):
+        # This function spawns a child process to insulate the main
+        # test-running process from all the signals. It then
+        # communicates with that child process over a pipe and
+        # re-raises information about any exceptions the child
+        # throws. The real work happens in self.run_test().
+        os_done_r, os_done_w = os.pipe()
+        with nested(closing(os.fdopen(os_done_r)),
+                    closing(os.fdopen(os_done_w, 'w'))) as (done_r, done_w):
+            child = os.fork()
+            if child == 0:
+                # In the child process; run the test and report results
+                # through the pipe.
+                try:
+                    done_r.close()
+                    # Have to close done_w again here because
+                    # exit_subprocess() will skip the enclosing with block.
+                    with closing(done_w):
+                        try:
+                            self.run_test()
+                        except:
+                            pickle.dump(traceback.format_exc(), done_w)
+                        else:
+                            pickle.dump(None, done_w)
+                except:
+                    print 'Uh oh, raised from pickle.'
+                    traceback.print_exc()
+                finally:
+                    exit_subprocess()
+
+            done_w.close()
+            # Block for up to MAX_DURATION seconds for the test to finish.
+            r, w, x = select.select([done_r], [], [], self.MAX_DURATION)
+            if done_r in r:
+                tb = pickle.load(done_r)
+                if tb:
+                    self.fail(tb)
+            else:
+                os.kill(child, signal.SIGKILL)
+                self.fail('Test deadlocked after %d seconds.' %
+                          self.MAX_DURATION)
 
 
 class BasicSignalTests(unittest.TestCase):
+    def trivial_signal_handler(self, *args):
+        pass
+
     def test_out_of_range_signal_number_raises_error(self):
         self.assertRaises(ValueError, signal.getsignal, 4242)
 
-        def trivial_signal_handler(*args):
-            pass
-
         self.assertRaises(ValueError, signal.signal, 4242,
-                          trivial_signal_handler)
+                          self.trivial_signal_handler)
 
     def test_setting_signal_handler_to_none_raises_error(self):
         self.assertRaises(TypeError, signal.signal,
                           signal.SIGUSR1, None)
 
+    def test_getsignal(self):
+        hup = signal.signal(signal.SIGHUP, self.trivial_signal_handler)
+        self.assertEquals(signal.getsignal(signal.SIGHUP),
+                          self.trivial_signal_handler)
+        signal.signal(signal.SIGHUP, hup)
+        self.assertEquals(signal.getsignal(signal.SIGHUP), hup)
+
+
 class WakeupSignalTests(unittest.TestCase):
     TIMEOUT_FULL = 10
     TIMEOUT_HALF = 5
@@ -232,7 +240,7 @@
                 os.kill(ppid, self.signum)
                 time.sleep(0.2)
             finally:
-                os._exit(0)
+                exit_subprocess()
 
         try:
             os.close(w)