History of the Vibrator

Picture the scene: a doctor’s surgery, about a hundred and fifty years ago. A young woman comes into the surgery in some distress and obviously in need of some attention.

            Patient - “Doctor, doctor, I’m really worried.”

            Doctor - “What seems to be the problem?”

            Patient - “I’m anxious, I can’t sleep, I’m irritable, I keep having erotic                                 fantasies, and my vagina is incredibly moist.”

            Doctor - “It’s ok, calm down, get a grip, you’re hysterical. I've got just                                 the thing...”

So you’re probably thinking that the doc prescribed some pills or a mild sedative to ease the patient’s concerns. Well you’d be wrong. The doctor or nurse would masturbate the patient to climax. That seemed to do the trick every time and another contented patient was cured of their ills.

The trouble is, with an increasing number of “hysterical” women around, doctors had quite a job on their hands (quite literally). They needed a solution; an invention that would relieve them of the relieving.

With cases of repetitive strain injury on the increase, doctors were themselves overcome with a wave of ecstasy when a solution finally found its way into the hands of the world’s sexually frustrated women. The vibrator. Here's our potted history of a medical marvel turned fashionable funstick.

1869 - A New Hope

American George Taylor was the first true vibrator innovator, inventing the steam powered vibrator known as the “manipulator”. Remove all those images of steam trains from your brain; there were no chimneys with smoke coming out and it certainly didn’t go “toot toot” when it picked up speed. It actually took on the form of a table with a hole in the middle. Hardly the most arousing of images but all good inventions start with a pilot effort.

George Taylor's patent designs for the world's first clitoris clouter.

The medical fraternity soon caught on to joys of mechanical masturbation and set about producing a variety of new devices to help their patients.

How to win Scrapheap Challenge #72.

1880 - It's Electric!

It wasn’t long, however, before steam had been replaced by electric. New plug-in devices were used extensively in doctor’s surgeries, allowing more patients with hysteria than ever to be treated.

At the time hysteria was considered a disease and doctors were pulling out all the stops to cope with the demand. Around this time there were also an increasing number of spas that had acquired these electrical devices. Some of these spas were already using rather crude methods of relief using high pressure hoses. Supposedly a jet of water in the right place could bring a woman to climax in under four minutes.

Wholesome sweet relief.

1920 - Home Pleasures

By the early 1900s vibrators had found their way into the home under the guise of “body massagers.” These were available via mail order and were marketed as a cure for various illnesses ranging from headaches and asthma to fading beauty and even tuberculosis. Their use as a tool of pleasure was never stated, but somewhere along the line the penny dropped and an industry was born.

Not content with taking the skin off her right boob, Marjorie sets about using the Unique Rotary Action to flay her entire body.

Mid 1900s - Going Down

The advent of cinema did vibrators no favours whatsoever. Some of the early black and white silent films portrayed the use of body massagers in a sexual way and they became largely discredited by a still very prudish society. Vibrators were forced underground; deep underground.

1960s - Attack of the Bones

The swinging 60s were a salvation and even liberally minded doctors were now recommending all sorts of gadgets for masturbation purposes. The sexual revolution was well underway and sex shops would go on to make sex toys an acceptable part of modern society.

All in a night's work.

2008 - The Gateway to Cybersex?

Recent surveys suggest that 75% of American woman now own a vibrator and the very latest model to hit the shelves actually reacts to voice commands – hands free you might say. You can even personalise commands if you have a favoured way of demanding attention. Men, it seems, are rapidly being replaced by miniature robots that will obey a woman’s every desire. Welcome to the 21st Century.