Don't forget the classic sexual study from the Victorian era, Havelock 
Ellis's four volume Psychology of Sex.  It was so controversial that it was 
not printed in Britain.  It was printed in English in German--the Germans, 
of course, saw this as science--and then smuggled into Britain.

Harold S. Forsythe
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jon Kukla" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, May 21, 2007 1:34 PM
Subject: Re: Anne Pemberton's query


>  As Anne Pemberton noted in her query, Thomas and Martha Jefferson didn't
> have a son; or more accurately their only male child survived only a few
> weeks.
>  And if I remember the date range correctly, Jefferson himself was long
> dead before ingenious Victorians were inventing and marketing the
> devices mentioned.
>  Social historians have produced a considerable scholarly literature
> about the 19th-century hysteria over the alleged medical consequences of
> masturbation. Several of these works describe Victorian-era contraptions
> designed to prevent "self-abuse." For anyone interested in reading more
> about these aspects of medical/social history, the first two books by
> Laqueur and Horowitz are probably the best place to start:
>
> Thomas W. Laqueur, Solitary Sex: A Cultural History of Masturbation (New
> York, 2003)
>
> Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz, Rereading Sex: Battles over Sexual Knowledge and
> Suppression in Nineteenth-Century America (New York, 2002)
>
> Roy Porter, Flesh in the Age of Reason: The Modern Foundations of Body and
> Soul (New York, 2003)
>
> Roy Porter and Lesley Hall, The Facts of Life: The Creation of Sexual
> Knowledge in Britain, 1650-1950 (New Haven, 1995)
>
> Roy Porter, "Forbidden Pleasures: Enlightenment Literature of Sexual
> Advice," in Paula Bennett and Vernon A. Rosario II, eds., Solitary
> Pleasures: The Historical, Literary, and Artistic Discourses of
> Autoeroticism (New York, 1995), 75-98.
>
> Alex Comfort, The Anxiety Makers: Some Curious Preoccupations of the
> Medical Profession (London, 1967)
>
> =======================================
>
> Dr. Jon Kukla, Executive Vice-President
> Red Hill - The Patrick Henry National Memorial
> 1250 Red Hill Road
> Brookneal, Virginia 24528
> www.redhill.org
> Phone 434-376-2044 or 800-514-7463