the reasons for his beliefs, they had long-lasting effects on society and many of the myths that still surround masturbation can be directly attributed to his way of thinking. The Sans became more and more famous and Dr Kellogg himself became something of a demagogue. He began to concentrate less on his fundamental beliefs and more on scientific facts and theories.
A major step in this direction came when a patient showed him a little wheat mattress a friend had sent her to aid her digestive problems. Invented by Henry Perky from Denver, they were what we now know as Shredded Wheat. At this time Shredded Wheat was not thought of as a breakfast food. Originally it was a main course, a natural food that followed the true Grahamite tradition. As well as the original Shredded Wheat there was a whole host of recipes associated with this biscuit. These ranged from banana croquettes with Shredded Wheat to cheese and Shredded Wheat toast – the list was endless. Perky even founded a scientific institute devoted to training demonstrators on how to educate the ordinary housewife on its uses.
In the humble Shredded Wheat the good Dr Kellogg saw the potential for the first ready-to-eat breakfast cereal and went about creating his own. After much experimentation he came up with Granose, the first flaked wheat cereal. Once again the Sans featured heavily in the development of this little wonder flake. As Kellogg put his ideas into commercial production he met with some stiff opposition, not least from Perky himself, who wasn't about to let anyone rip off his invention and had taken no less than 47 patents out with regards to Shredded Wheat. The effect of the cereal wars was that Battle Creek exploded with cereal and health-food manufacturers and almost overnight the place became known as ‘cereal central’. Many more wars ensued in the battle for the cereal that would rid the world of all its ailments.
John Kellogg was finally forced to turn the ailing Kellogg’s company over to his brother, William, who although he had worked at the Sans with John, had little interest in curing the public of bad eating habits and masturbation but in making money. So was born the Kellogg’s brand as we now know it today, but its original founder left his legacy in the myths that still surround masturbation to this day.
Late 19th Century to early 20th Century
Remember, as far back as Ancient Egyptian times we saw the emergence of the medical but vague term ‘hysteria’. At the same time as Kellogg’s and Graham were busy producing cornflakes and crackers, the medical profession was busy curing women of what was thought to be the often life-threatening disease known as, you guessed it, ‘hysteria’. Just as in Ancient Egypt, this disease only afflicted the female sex and caused a myriad symptoms, running the gamut from anxiety, irritability, nervousness, feelings of heaviness in the lower abdomen, sleepiness, to name but a few. Of course nowadays we recognize ‘hysteria’ for what it actually is: horniness.
Back then, though, the cure for hysteria was a simple one. Doctors would manually masturbate their female patients to orgasm. Of course the end results were not called ‘orgasms’; instead they would be referred to as ‘paroxysms’. As you can imagine, this was, in many cases, a time-consuming cure, and often a temporary one. Can you imagine how tired these doctors’ hands must have been?
So, being as this was the start of the Industrial Revolution, nothing was, or at least seemed, impossible and in order to relieve their cramped hands, many doctors turned to mechanical methods to help their patients reach the desired state of paroxysm. Unfortunately these machines were often poorly constructed and caused injury to the patient, but, as is often the case, electricity came to the rescue. In 1880, more than a decade before the invention of the electric iron and vacuum cleaner, an enterprising English physician, Dr Joseph Mortimer Granville, patented the electromechanical vibrator.
The vibrator was an immediate hit with doctors and patients alike and at the turn of the century, as electricity became more widely available across American homes, the humble, if often scary by today's standards, electric vibrator became a staple in many homes. Of course, when you consider this was a time when women were still considered the ‘fairer sex’, the actual use for the vibrator had to be disguised. Many popular magazines of the time would sell them as ‘personal massagers’, although their actual use was not exactly a well-kept secret.
For a while electric vibrators were acceptable and commonplace in most American homes, but that would change with the advent of the silent movie. Silent movies were not just used to make Charlie Chaplin a superstar of his time, but also by some enterprising young men, who saw their potential to provide pornographic images. As the trade in pornography grew and images of what were considered loose, wanton women using the humble electric vibrator began to grow, the popularity of the Personal Massager became tarnished and over time vibrators all but disappeared from the American home. For now…
Late 20h Century
In spite of anti-masturbation zealots like Graham and Kellogg, masturbation was by all accounts still a popular, if secret, pastime. During the 1940s and ‘50s the interest in people's sexual habits began to grow, at least from a scientific and medical standpoint. The most famous of the early pioneers of American sexuality, who was not afraid to ask Americans about their sexual habits was Alfred Kinsey. His work in the ‘40s and ‘50s included studies that asked Americans what were then considered shocking questions, such as, did they masturbate to orgasm? These studies revealed that at the time 94 per cent of American men who were asked did masturbate to orgasm, while approximately 40 per cent of American women reported that they also masturbated. Kinsey's research was, at the time, groundbreaking and in many ways opened the doors to modern-day sexual research.
In the early 1970s there was a veritable explosion in the interest surrounding America's bedroom habits. By this time we had seen the sexual revolution, women had access to the Pill and the feminist movement was gaining momentum, all of which help contribute to that interest. For example: Shere Hite surveyed 1,000,000 American women and the results were then published in a report that was known as the Hite Report. This was a document consisting of 510 pages that detailed the masturbation habits of the respondents. Whenever I go back and read the Hite Report of 1976, I'm always struck by how little attitudes to masturbation have changed since that report was done. Many of the answers to the survey mirror questions and comments I get from Clitical visitors to this day. Many women back then reported a feeling of guilt, even when they physically enjoyed the act of masturbating, and any subsequent orgasm, but we will delve into that subject a little later. What Hite did discover was this: 82 per cent of those who responded to the survey reported masturbating, so women were doing it for themselves, albeit then often feeling guilty about it.
At the same time as Hite was moving and shaking the world of female sexuality, another prominent figure was also emerging. Betty Dodson, who is now often referred to as the 'mother of masturbation’. Dodson was busy at this time extolling the benefits of masturbation, and yet her teaching encompassed so much more. Dodson would actively encourage women to embrace their vulvas and to stop thinking of them as something dirty, instead realizing that they were as unique and beautiful as their owners. I can recall the first time I ever saw her now-famous collection of pictures that, as an artist, she had drawn. Each one depicted a real woman's vulva and highlighted beautifully that every one was different. Dobson was the first sex educator to actively promote the use of the vibrator when it came to masturbation.
During the ‘70s and ‘80s we began to see a slight change in attitudes toward masturbation in general. Whilst it was still not something that you could openly discuss with your parents, or even your friends, the shame and guilt that for so long had been a part of something that was a natural and healthy act of sexuality began to subside, at least a little.
This change in the ‘90s, when we once more saw something of a backlash against not just masturbation, but open sexuality in general, culminated in an incident that featured the then Surgeon General, Jocelyn Elders, who agreed that masturbation should be included in any meaningful sex education programs that were to be taught
