It’s no secret that we’re big vibrator fans at Poosh. So when we discovered that one of the experts we’ve been working with recently, Dr. Carol Queen, was not only a staff sexologist at Good Vibes but also the curator of the Antique Vibrator Museum, we needed to learn more.
Located in San Francisco, the museum was started by Good Vibes founder Joani Blank as a part of the first Good Vibes store.
“It was small for a museum, but were there any larger ones? No.” Dr. Carol says.
Since then, the collection has grown from an antique bookshelf displaying around six vibes to a full room that houses about a century of old vibrators.
“These devices—like all of sexuality, honestly—have a history, and knowing more about the surprising and underground stories sheds new light on how we think of the present, as well as the way women’s sexuality was seen in previous decades and centuries,” Dr. Carol says.
And now, without further ado, the craziest, most shocking things we learned from the Antique Vibrator Museum. (You’re welcome for all the fun facts to share at your next social event.)
1. The history of vibrators is longer than most people assume.
“Many people likely think they were created in the 1960s as part of the sexual revolution, but their history is much deeper than that. The first ones ran via clockwork, where you wind a key and it vibrates until it runs down, like an old alarm clock. (Does anyone have one of those in their attic? Send it over. We don’t have one.),” says Dr. Carol.
2. Yep, they actually were used by doctors to treat hysteria.
“Hysteria was indeed one of the initial medical/healthcare uses of the vibrator. A subset of physicians had long treated this ailment with vulva massage done by hand, with very few of them (or their patients) realizing the ‘hysterical paroxysm of relief’ that resulted was an orgasm,” Dr. Carol explains. “And, of course, those ladies felt better from the treatment. Orgasms are good for you. They’re relaxing. (Just not relaxing for the doctors, who were overworking their wrists.)
“The vibrator was a labor-saving device for them. Besides the sore wrists, it was a great gig for doctors because, soon enough, the patients would need to come back for another treatment. Even Sigmund Freud took hysteria seriously. Although, like everything else, he preferred to talk about it.”
3. Vibrators began to be marketed toward consumers in 1900.
“An extremely significant moment in the history of the vibrator is when it became not just a professional device, but one marketed to consumers, which happened at the Paris Exhibition of 1900. These were promoted to bring ‘health, vigor, and beauty,’” Dr. Carol says.
“My fave advertising line is: ‘Almost like a miracle is the healing power of vibration when rightly applied.’ So true. And in the 1910s, the Hamilton Beach company (which made vibrators back then) published a book called Health & How To Get It, and every chapter was about a different ailment that you could treat with a vibrator. Hysteria, yes, but also hemorrhoids, dandruff, and tuberculosis.”
4. And in 1917, there were more electric vibrators in consumers’ homes than toasters.
“The historian of this vibrator story, Rachel Maines (The Technology of Orgasm), has a statistic I adore. In 1917, in the US, there were more electric vibrators in consumers’ homes than electric toasters. What a hoot!” Dr. Carol says.
5. Vibrators first appeared in porn in the late 1910s.
“Right about that same time, vibrators began to appear occasionally in porn movies where their sexual use was obvious,” Dr. Carol says. “The use of the vibe as a sexual device began to be illustrated in porn in the late 1910s. At least, some people had already figured it out. And as those movies began to circulate, doctors were put in an awkward position. They slowly stopped treating hysteria with vibes … until the Kinsey Reports (and more porn) in the late ’40s and early ’50s brought the embarrassment to a head, and the American Medical Association voted hysteria out of the medical books. The stage was set for vibrators’ next act: starring in sex shops.”
6. The museum’s vibrators are sourced from all kinds of places.
Joani received at least one of the vibrators in the original collection as a gift and found others at secondhand stores and flea markets, according to Dr. Carol.
“Since then, many of our vibrators have been donated by customers. This is still the case. About four times a year, I hear from someone who has found one in an older relative’s house and wants to donate it. We are so honored to get these. I must quickly say here that we almost never know whether the antiques we receive were used as erotic vibrators or simply on sore muscles. But they might have been, and the old technology is so worth displaying in any event. Health improvement is very much part of the vibrator’s history.
“I also started buying antique vibes from estate sales and from resale sites like eBay. When we expanded the museum to full-room size over a decade ago, we also went on eBay regularly to fill out our collection.”
7. The oldest vibrator in the museum dates back to the 1800s.
For this edition of “vibrator or torture device,” may we present to you Dr. Macaura’s Pulsocon Blood Circulator, which is likely the oldest vibrator on display in the museum.
“It’s a bit hard to know because it was made for many decades without any change to its design, so the one in the museum could be as old as 1880 or earlier or as late as the early 20th century. Most old vibrators were redesigned with at least some changes every few years, but Dr. Macaura must have thought it was perfect just as it was. (I’m not sure moderns would agree. It was a hand-crank vibe—like an egg beater.)”
Ofc, we had to ask, “Did these crazy designs actually work?” According to Dr. Carol, that’s an emphatic yes.
“They are as heavy and steampunk-looking as the pictures imply. But the bottom line was, they vibrated, and vibration is a sensation that many people love,” she explains. “Though these were not specifically made as sex toys (to begin with), they did facilitate orgasms for at least some of the people who owned them.”
9. Dr. Carol’s three faves from the collection are:
“From the 1910s case, the Detwiller. This is extremely rare because it ran on compressed gas or air. The beautiful wooden box has a paper label inside that shows it hooked up to a big tank. I assume that that technological advance didn’t pan out, and I can only hope there were no explosions,” she says.
“From the 1930s, the gorgeous, emerald-green Art Deco design (and box picture too) of the Son-Chief Magnetic Massage. I think this is such a classic beauty.
“From the 1960s, the rarest vibrator of all—the one-of-a-kind Hippie Homemade, crafted by artisans in a hippie commune for the enjoyment of all its members. (I wonder if they all slept on one huge mattress too? Who knows.) I love love love that an old Revere Ware saucepan handle was used. Reuse/recycle!”
10. There are some forward-looking women to thank for the vibrators we know and love in modern times.
“We really need to thank forward-looking women for vibrators’ current popularity,” Dr. Carol says.
“The first woman-founded sex shop was started in Germany a decade or so after WWII by Beate Uhse. Her chain of stores still exists.
“In New York, in the 1960s, fine artist Betty Dodson started painting overtly erotic work after she discovered orgasm via vibrators. She switched to teaching women via her famed Bodysex workshops and wrote books about masturbation and vibrators.
“A woman who saw one of her early presentations, Dell Williams, started the first U.S. store for women, Eve’s Garden, in NYC in the early ’70s.
“And Joani Blank followed not long after, partly because she was involved as a facilitator in feminist sex therapist Lonnie Barbach’s ‘pre-orgasmic women’s groups’ where they recommended vibrator masturbation to the women who came to the sessions. This was Joani’s inspiration for founding Good Vibes, and the rest is history.
Also, if you catch tuberculosis, you will need more than a vibrator. Go to the doctor. It’s a bacterium.”
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