My profession has made me very familiar with this subject and the many melancholy human tragedies of this character which have transpired before my own eyes have impressed upon me the great necessity of a device which will aid those concerned in the treatment of such cases, and the cure from this disastrous practice, and which will at the same time give the person under treatment all necessary personal liberty.
Her contraption consisted of a steel and leather jacket
which enveloped the entire lower torso. Perforations allowed
urine to escape. A hinged trap-door, bolted and padlocked in
back, was opened by a second individual in order to allow for
defecation. Other such devices were sold accompanied by
handcuffs for additional protection.
About the turn of the century, a Michigan physician described his patient, a girl of seven:
She had been taught the habit by vicious children, at a country
house from which she was adopted in the summer of 1895. I
learned from the foster mother that on the advice of physicians
she had given her worm remedies, they thinking that, perhaps,
the irritation was due to the migration of pinworms. The parts
had been kept thoroughly cleansed; she had been made to sleep
in sheep-skin pants and jackets made into one garment with her
hands tied to a collar about her neck; her feet were tied to the
foot-board and by a strap about her waist she was fastened to
the head-board so that she couldn't slide down in bed and use
her heels; she had been reasoned with, scolded, and whipped,
and in spite of it all she managed to keep up the habit.
This benevolent physician snipped and cleansed the tissue,
thinking that the problem was due to irritation from
infection. The first night after the operation, she tore off the
dressings, opened up the wound with her fingers, and bled
profusely. (Schwartz, 1973)
Although we often think of the United States as more
advanced than its conservative European counterparts, concern
with masturbation declined more slowly here. After
World War I, supply houses still carried sexual restraints in
their catalogues. Medical textbooks continued to mention
mechanical devices, but noted their relative ineffectiveness
in other than small children. As late as the 1970s a well-
known textbook in urology mentioned several unfavorable
conditions caused by self-manipulation.
Dr. Martha Wolfenstein has traced changes in attitude
toward masturbation through her analysis of the publications
of the United States Children's Bureau. Through the
years these pamphlets have presented the accepted standards
of child rearing. (Wolfenstein, 1953)
Between 1914 and 1921, the danger of children's sexuality
was painfully evident. If not promptly and rigorously
squelched, both thumb-sucking and masturbation would
permanently damage the child. The prescribed treatment
was to bind the hands and feet, the body spread-eagled on
the bed, so that the child could not suck his thumb, touch the
genitals, or even rub thighs together. Total eradication of any
self-pleasuring was the goal of responsible parents.
In 1929, the focus of severity shifted to early rigorous
bowel training, and exact feeding schedules. For the first
time, milder methods were recommended for the control of
masturbation. A baby could be given a toy to divert his attention.
In 1938, masturbation was presented as normal exploration,
of little consequence. Sexuality was no longer seen as
crippling and dangerous, but rather as an unimportant incident,
often embarrassing to the mother. In contrast, thumb-
sucking still required mechanical restraint.