Providentia

The Sex Wars (Part 3 of 4)

Continued from Part 2

Along with being a fierce advocate of free speech and women's rights during the 19th century, Ida Craddock was also a tragic example of the dangers posed by Anthony Comstock's morality crusade. 

Born in 1857, her father died when she was only four months old and she was raised by her puritanical mother.  Despite this stern upbringing, Ida Craddock became a freethinker relatively early in her life.   After being blocked from entering the University of Pennsylvania as its first female undergraduate, she went on to teach stenography to women students at Giraud College in Philadelphia.   She also joined the National Liberal League and was part of the Free Thought movement.  

By the time she was 30, Craddock developed a strong interest in Theosophy and the occult which took her in a rather unusual direction.    Along with trying to combine religious and mystical writings from around the world into a single discipline, she began lecturing on sexuality.  Her topics focused on religion and sexuality with titles such as "Survivals of Sex Worship in Christianity and in Paganism" and "What Christianity Has Done For the Marital Relation".   Since the first English translation of the Kama Sutra had become widely available by 1843,  the book developed a strong, if discreet, following throughout the Western world despite it being regarded as obscene by many moral crusaders, including Anthony Comstock.   For Ida Craddock however, the book was a revelation and she eventually declared herself to be a Priestess and Pastor of the Church of Yoga.   

Considering she was an unmarried woman living in the last part of the 19th century, becoming a student of various forms of eroticism was a shocking development (it certainly shocked her mother).   While became romantically involved with two men during  this time in her life (thus putting theory into practise),  she never married.   Despite the best efforts of Anthony Comstock and his moral league, the Free Love movement was still encouraging greater openness about sexuality and Ida Craddock became one of the movement's leaders.    Along with becoming a sex therapist in Chicago, she also wrote a series of books and pamphlets that would establish her as an authority on religion and sexuality.    Two of her books, "Lunar and Sex Worship" and "Sex Worship (Continued)" reflected her radical ideas about religion and sexuality.   This included her suggestion that the cross is a symbol of sexual union and the sex instinct was the underlying principle of all religion.

Ida Craddock's most controversial book, "Heavenly Bridegrooms" was first published in 1894.   In the book, she openly admitted to being sexually active despite having no husband.  In her case however, there was no scandal since she actually was married - to an angel named "Soph".    Not only did "Soph" visit her nightly, but their sexual relations provided her with divinely-inspired enlightenment.  In her book, Craddock stated that sex with her "husband" was often so noisy that the neighbours complained!   She expanded on the ideas in her book in a later paper titled "Psychic Wedlock" about the spiritual justification of her angelic marriage.   As she pointed out, the Virgin Mary had herself been impregnated by a heavenly bridegroom. 

Though her mother tried to have Ida Craddock committed at one point, there is no real evidence that she was mentally ill.  From today's perspective, her writing about an angelic husband may have either been pure delusion or a clever way for an unmarried woman to explain her sexual experience without being regarded as promiscuous.   Whatever the explanation, Heavenly Bridegrooms was largely overlooked during Ida Craddock's lifetime and may helped explain why she has been so completely forgotten as a sexual and feminist pioneer.   When she is remembered at all, it is for her numerous pamphlets and marriage manuals on sex education and birth control, which predated Margaret Sanger by decades.

Her pamphlets must have seemed radical enough though.  Along with endorsing birth control and more sexual freedom for women, she also argued that husbands who forced themselves on their wives without their consent were guilty of rape - an unheard-of notion at the time.    She also suggested that intercourse be prolonged to give women the opportunity to reach orgasm along with their husbands.   In one often-quoted passage from her pamphlet, "The Wedding Night", she suggested that:

Even when a woman has already had pleasurable experience of genital contact, she requires each time to be aroused amorously, before that organ, in its state of activity, can become attractive. For a man to exhibit, to even an experienced wife, his organ ready for action when she herself is not amorously aroused, is, as a rule, not sexually attractive to her; on the contrary, it is often sexually repulsive, and at times out and out disgusting to her. Every woman of experience knows that, when she is ready, she can cause the man to become sexually active fast enough.

Considering that a husband's "rights" were considered to automatically trump a wife's "duties" at the time, Ida Craddock was proposing nothing less than a major shift in the relationship between men and women.  Though she was hardly the only sexual heretic during that same period (Havelock Ellis was fighting his own battles with censors in the United Kingdom),  her books and pamphlets came under fire by Anthony Comstock's morality crusade.   In 1894, Ida Craddock wrote an article defending a controversial belly dancer "Little Egypt" whose erotic performances led to Comstock's demand that her burlesque show be shut down.  After attending the dancer's performance at the World Columbian Exposition in Chicago,  Craddock wrote that the dancing was actually a sign of a woman's sexual self-control.    In an article published in "The World", she even went so far as to suggest that the same dance be taught to married women to enhance their own sex lives.

Anthony Comstock declared her article to be "obscene" and banned any attempt at sending it through the mail (which blocked national distribution for the paper that published it).   In the meantime, Ida Craddock's mother was making arrangements to have her daughter committed and even threatened to burn all her papers and manuscripts if successful.    Though she was forcibly admitted to the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane in 1898, she was released after only three months without any legal decision being made about her sanity.  

After failing to have Little Egypt's show shut down, Anthony Comstock decided to go after Ida Craddock instead.  Not long after her release from the hospital, Comstock had her arrested for sending copies of her pamphlet "Right Marital Living" through the mail.   She was released after famed lawyer Clarence Darrow came to her defense.    She followed up on this victory by moving to New York City and providing sex counseling right under Anthony Comstock's nose.    About her decision to move to New York City, she would say that:  ""I have an inward feeling that I am really divinely led here to New York to face this wicked and depraved man Comstock in open court." 

But her battle against Anthony Comstock was likely hopeless from the start.   Not only did he have far more supporters than Craddock was able to overcome, he had the law on his side as well.  On March 5, 1902, Ida Craddock was arrested for trying to send copies of her pamplet, "The Wedding Night" through the mail.   Her trial was a foregone conclusion since the judge labelled her work "indescribably obscene" and refused to have it presented to the jury.    The members of the jury declared her guilty even though they had to rely on the judge's opinion completely.    According to one newspaper, the jury found her guilty without even bothering to meet in private to discuss the case.

Sentenced to three months in the local workhouse, Ida Craddock had to cope with the harsh prison conditions as well as abuse from the guards and other prisoners.   Despite free speech advocates rallying to her cause, she was immediately rearrested under the federal Comstock law once her sentence was completed.   In the new trial, she refused to let her lawyers try to help her with an insanity plea.  On October 10, she was found guilty and sentenced to a five-year sentence.  

Ida Craddock likely felt she had no options left at that point since she would never survive in the federal women's prison.    On October 16, the day before she was to report to prison, her body was found in her apartment.  She had slashed her wrists and left the gas running in her apartment although which of these actually killed her is still a mystery.

Continue to Part 4

 

 

 

When Suicide is Listed in Obituaries

Historically, people who die by suicide and those who survive them have been perceived more negatively than those affected by other types of death (e.g., Reynolds & Cimbolic, 1988). Yet, it is unclear whether these negative perceptions actually lead to decreased social and emotional support for people bereaved by suicide.  A study published in Crisis: The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention examined whether specifying suicide as the cause of death in an obituary impacts perceptions of a decedent and willingness to provide support to the decedent’s family. A group of 253 participants were randomly assigned to read one of three fictional obituaries that were identical except for the stated cause of death (suicide, cancer, or drug overdose). Participants responded to questions about the decedent and behaviors toward the family. Results showed that people depicted as dying by suicide were viewed more negatively than decedents depicted as dying due to cancer. Contrary to the research prediction, participants endorsed similar levels of willingness to provide support to the bereaved family regardless of the type of death specified in the obituary.  The findings suggest that, even though those who die by suicide are viewed more negatively, their survivors may receive support that is similar to people bereaved by other types of death.

For more information

The Xhosa Prophecy

How dangerous can a prophecy be? And what happens to a prophet who turns out to be wrong? The story of Nongqawuse and the prophecy that led to the deaths of thousands of her fellow Xhosa in the mid-19^th century is an important morality despite being so little known outside of South Africa.

Even in the early days of British colonialism in southern Africa, the various tribes that made up the Xhosa nation were one of the largest ethnic groups in what would eventually become the Eastern Cape Province of the Republic of South Africa. Though apartheid policies still lay in the future, the Xhosa were largely shut out of most businesses and depended on their cattle herds and crops for food and trade. Despite a major outbreak of cattle lung sickness that had struck the Xhosa cattle herds between 1855 and 1856, the economic disaster that would devastate Xhosa society came from another direction entirely.

According to historical records, the Xhosa girl at the centre of the crisis that would follow is believed to have been born in 1840. After losing both of her parents at an early age, Nongqawuse was raised by her uncle, Mhlakaza, a prominent spiritualist. There is very little information about Nongqawuse except that her childhood appeared otherwise normal.

Everything changed in the spring of 1856 when Nongqawuse and her friend Nombada went to fetch water from a nearby river. After returning, the fifteen-year old girl Nongqawuse told her uncle that she had met the spirits of two of her ancestors who were using her to relay an important prophecy to her people. The prophecy instructed them to destroy their crops and kill their cattle as a sacrifice to the ancestors who would rise up and drive all the white settlers into the sea. After the settlers were gone, the sun would turn red and a new golden age would come for the Xhosa.

To read more, check out this post I wrote on the JREF Swift blog. 

New Study Shows Alzheimer-Related Deaths on the Rise

A new study released by the Alzheimer's Association paints a grim picture of the health consequences of Alzheimer's Disease and other dementias in the United States alone.   According to the latest figures released in the report, one in three seniors experiences some form of dementia before dying and Alzheimer's Disease alone represents the sixth leading cause of death in the United States overall and the fifth leading cause for people over 65.   As of this year, an estimated 5.2 million Americans have some form of Alzheimer's (including 200,000 Americans under the age of 65).   Since the disease is frequently underdiagnosed, many patients and the family members may have no idea they have it.   More women than men have the disease with 16 per cent of all women aged 71 years and older being affected (as opposed to 11 per cent of men in that age group). 

The cost of caring for Alzheimer's Disease and other dementias has risen to $203 billion and is expected to climb over $1.2 trillion by 2050 if no treatment advances are made.    Despite being the most common form of dementia, other diseses such as Vascular  (stroke-related) Dementia, Parkinson's Disease, and Pick's Disease are also expected to increase in the coming years.  At present, someone in the United States develops Alzheimer's every 68 seconds.  That figure is expected to drop to every 33 seconds by 2050.

In a press release publicizing the report,  Beth Kallmyer, vice president of constituent services for the Alzheimer's Association stresses that ""Alzheimer's disease is a public health crisis that is here."   "One in three seniors is dying with Alzheimer's or another dementia. For other major diseases, the death rate is going down because the federal government funds and invests in research," she said in an interview with US News Health.  "We have not seen that same commitment for Alzheimer's disease."  

Along with the devastating toll on dementia patients, the disease also places a heavy burden on family members who are often obliged to act as full-time caregivers with little or no financial support from government programs.  In 2012 alone, more than 15 million Americans acted as caregivers for Alzheimer's patients and the estimated 17 billion hours of unpaid care they provide was valued at $216 billlion.   For those expenses which are covered by government programs, the total cost of caring for 5 million Alzheimers patients is $203 billion, most of which comes from Medicare and Medicaid.   The current health care system, already strained to the limit, is expected to be completely overwhelmed by the soaring increase in health care costs required to care for dementia patients in the coming years. 

Along with calling for increased government aid for Alzheimer's patients, the report provides new guidelines for diagnosis which can catch dementia cases sooner when treatment might be more effective.   Facts and figures on Alzheimer's Disease and some of the risk factors associated with it are also provided as well as a breakdown in figures across the United States.   Southern and western states are expected to show the greatest increase in the coming years.  Alaska, Colorado, Nevada, Idaho, Utah and Wyoming will more than double the number of Alzheimer patients over the next 20 years.

To download the report.

Exploring the Mystery of REM Sleep

“To sleep, perchance to dream”

What role does REM sleep play in humans and animals?   And why do we dream at all?   Ever since the 1950s, researchers have known that sleep occurs in different stages and that the deepest part of sleep, which usually happens in the early hours of the morning, can be recognized by rapid, random eye movements.  

This stage of sleep is now known as REM (rapid eye movement) sleep and is linked to extremely vivid dreaming.   Among the different theories about REM sleep’s function are that it helps in forming new memories, stimulates the central nervous system, and  restores brain chemistry to a normal balance. 

Along with rapid eye movements,  REM sleep is also recognized by low muscle tone and a rapid, shallow EEG pattern.  In most adults, REM sleep can happen four or five times on average each night making up only 25% of the total time spent sleeping.   Researchers have also found evidence of REM sleep in almost all land-based mammal and bird species and even some aquatic mammals such as dolphins. 

As for how REM sleep first evolved, a recent article published in the journal Dreaming has suggested an intriguing new hypothesis.  Written by Ionnanis Tsoukalas of Sweden’s Stockholm University, the article suggests that REM sleep, and dreaming in general, evolved out of an ancient defense mechanism still seen in many species.   Of different defense mechanisms used by animals in danger, Tsoukalas’ article focuses on tonic immobility, or the faint response.  

To read more, check out my new Psychology Today blog post.

The Sex Wars (Part 2 of 4)

Continued from Part 1

The years following the end of the U.S. Civil War saw a rise in conservative values and newspaper editorials regularly called for  measures to combat "immoral behaviour".   While women were still expected to know their place as wives and mothers,  a small but influential group of "loose women" still enjoyed many freedoms denied to "respectable women".   That included having their own income,  sex outside of marriage, and freedom to use birth control.    Despite the conservatism, prostitution was a booming business and madams were often independently wealthy in their own right.   Not only were brothels a common sight in virtually every American city but prostitutes even advertised their services in some newspapers.  

In many cases, women had few other options but prostitution considering the subsistence wages in the rare places that would even consider hiring women.   Even women who "married well" tended not to be wealthy in their own right since all their assets belonged to their husbands.    Despite the social stigma surrounding the sex trade, there were always new prospects.   And it was the prostitutes who provided the chief demand for contraceptives during the mid-19th century. 

But the backlash was already setting in.   While successful madams could run brothels that allowed them to enjoy luxurious lifestyles,  newspaper editorials condemning them were already selling papers.   In his 1869 book, The Women of New York: or Social Life in the Great City,  journalist George Ellington wrote at length on madams and their influence.  Describing them as "female fiends of the worst kind, who seem to have lost all the better qualities of nature", he also described madams as being the "friends and chosen companions of some of the wealthiest and most influential men of the city."    Though the legal crackdown after the Civil War largely ended the quiet life that many sex trade workers enjoyed, their refusal to see themselves as "fallen women" offended the Victorian sensibilities of the time.

Along with suppressing the sex trade however, there was also a backlash against contraceptives.   Religious figures denounced the sale of contraceptives in drugstores and books published in the 1860s and 1870 (with titles such as "Satan in Society") denounced birth control as a "violation of the laws of Heaven" and a "hydra-headed monster" that was meant to kill the American family.

When it came to preserving public morality though, nobody was more outspoken than Anthony Comstock.    After fighting in the Civil War (where he was offended by the profane language used by his fellow soldiers), Comstock settled in New York City where he became involved with various Christian movements including the Young Men's Christian Association.   In 1873, he founded the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice  and he became a major force in the U.S. drive to stem the rising tide of "immoral conduct".    In that same year,  Comstock and his followers managed to pressure the U.S. government into passing new legislation to block the shipping of "obscene materials" though the mail.   Though the official name of the new law was the "Act for The Suppression of Trade in, and Circulation of, Obscene Literature and Articles of Immoral Use, virtually everybody referred to it as the Comstock Act. 

Not only did the Act criminalize any obscene materials sent through the mail, but it also banned the possession of any materials deemed obscene, including contraceptives and abortifacients.   The Act also extended to "marriage manuals" and any educational information relating to venereal disease.  In fact, the Federal law made anyone selling or possessing these materials liable to a long prison sentence and a hefty fine.   The Comstock Act was quickly followed by similar legislation in 24 states which are still known collectively as the Comstock Laws.  While these laws were later challenged in court, the various decisions largely upheld the Constitutionality of the legislation.   There was also the thorny question of what constituted obscenity which vexed judges well into the 20th century (and still does today). 

More importantly, the Act appointed Comstock as a a special agent of the U.S. Postal Service (including the right to carry a gun) and gave him virtually absolute power in deciding what constituted obscenity.   Comstock was also free to arrest anyone whom he considered guilty of promoting or distributing obscene materials.  His definition of "lewd or obscene" was far broader than society had previously accepted and even medical textbooks featuring anatomically correct drawings were seized.  Comstock also shut down the Louisiana lottery which he felt contributed to gambling and related immorality.

Anthony Comstock became a polarizing figure in U.S. society.  While civil rights groups and sex trade workers condemned him, church groups considered him a hero.   He was also  mocked internationally and George Bernard Shaw coined the term "comstockery" after his play, Mrs. Warren's Profession, was deemed obscene under the Comstock Act.  In writing about Comstock and his crusade, Shaw said that, "Comstockery is the world's standing joke at the expense of the United States. Europe likes to hear of such things. It confirms the deep-seated conviction of the Old World that America is a provincial place, a second-rate country-town civilization after all."   Comstock, in turn, dismissed Shaw as an "Irish smut dealer". 

But George Bernard Shaw got off lightly compared to many other social reformers pushing for public education on sexuality and birth control.   Newspapers were banned from running advertisements for contraceptives and even news stories covering sexual topics could lead to newspapers being charged under the Comstock laws.   Comstock's wrath also fell on prominent suffragettes Victoria Woodhull and her sister Tennessee Celeste Claflin for their support of feminist issues such as legalized prostitution.   He even went so far as to arrest them for running an expose of a prominent preacher's adulterous affair (they were later acquitted).

Comstock's crusade meant an end to the sale and dissemination of contraceptives, marriage manuals, erotica, and other "obscene materials".   At least, these things could no longer be openly sold.   An underground black market continued to flourish for the sex trade workers and free thinkers determined to preserve the sexual freedom they had years before.   While they were harshly prosecuted whenever Comstock could get an opportunity, the marketeers he denounced as "moral cancer planters" and "old she-villains" continued to make contraceptives available.   Considering millions of women were demanding condoms and other forms of protection,  the bootleg trade was every bit as competitive and cut-throat as what the rumrunners were up to during the Prohibition era. 

Brooklyn entrepreneur, Joseph Bachrach, sold a wide range of contraceptives and other "erotic aids" which he manufactured himself in the home he shared with his wife and seven children.  His inventory included condoms,  vaginal shields, and "rubber ticklers" for sexual stimulation.    By the 1880s, Backrach's secret factory was turning out thousands of contraceptives to be snapped up by his eager customers.  And Backrach was hardly the only one.  Julius Schmid, creator of the Fourex, Sheik and Rameses condoms, was inspired to develop his products while working in a sausage factory.   When Comstock's vice squad raided Schmid's  factory at his 46th Street home (then the heart of New York's red light district), they found 696 prophylactic "skins" and "one form for manufacturing same".   Though Schmid was jailed and fined, that hardly stopped him from keeping up with the demand for his product.   As the first American to mass produce rubber condoms, Schmid eventually cornered the market and went on to become the main source of condoms sold to U.S. soldiers during World War I. 

One of the saddest stories associated with Comstock's crusade involved suffragette and sexual pioneer Ida Craddock whose fight for open discussion of sex and birth control, and her battle with Anthony Comstock led to her suicide.   More on that next week.

To be continued.

 

 

 

 

Preventing Suicide with Post-Discharge Follow-ups

The time period following discharge from inpatient psychiatry and emergency department (ED) treatment is one of heightened risk for repeat suicide attempts for patients. Evidence reported in the literature shows that follow-up contacts might reduce suicide risk, although there has not been a comprehensive and critical review of the evidence to date.  A new study published in Crisis: The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention evaluates evidence for the effectiveness of suicide prevention interventions that involve follow-up contacts with patients. The study used published empirical studies of follow-up interventions with suicidal behaviors (suicide, attempts, and ideation) as outcomes were searched. Study populations were inpatient psychiatric or ED patients being discharged to home. Contact modalities included phone, postal letter, postcards, in-person, and technology-based methods (e-mail and texting). Results showed that eight original studies, two follow-up studies, and one secondary analysis study met inclusion criteria. Five studies showed a statistically significant reduction in suicidal behavior. Four studies showed mixed results with trends toward a preventative effect and two studies did not show a preventative effect. The authors concluded that repeated follow-up contacts appear to reduce suicidal behavior. More research is needed, however, especially randomized controlled trials, to determine what specific factors might make follow-up contact modalities or methods more effective than others.

For the abstract.

LSD Psychiatrist Dead at 86

One of the early pioneers in the medical use of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) has died in Maryland at the age of 86.   Dr. Gerald D'Arcy Klee died March 10 of complications following surgery according to a statement issued by his family.    A prominent psychiatrist and medical educator, Dr. Klee is best-known as one of the  researchers working on the Edgewood Arsenal experiments conducted at the Edgewood Arsenal north of Baltimore, Maryland between 1952 and 1959.   The experiments, which are believed to have been linked to CIA research into mind control along with the more notorious MKULTRA project, involved testing LSD and other hallucinogenics on willing military subjects.  

Though the results were classified until 1975,  hundreds of U.S. soldiers were given LSD and THC as well as chemical and biological agents to study their effect on mental and physical functioning.    Due to the many claims filed by veterans during the 1970s indicating significant health problems resulting from the experiments, Congress launched a formal investigation to determine whether proper informed consent had been obtained from the soldiers who participated in the research.

Dr. Klee's involvement in the experiments came to light when he confirmed media reports that the University of Maryland School of Medicine's Psychiatric Institute had conducted the research.   "A large proportion of the people who have gotten involved in research in this area have been harebrained and irresponsible — Timothy Leary being the most notorious example — and a lot of the stuff that has been published reflects that," Dr. Klee  said in a 1975 interview with the Baltimore Evening Sun.  "We didn't have any axes to grind, and the university's role was to conduct scientific experimentation," he said. "The interests of the University of Maryland group were purely scientific, and the military was just there", he added.   He also admitted to using LSD himself prior to conducting the research.  "I felt obliged to take it for experimental reasons and also because I didn't think it would be fair to administer a drug to someone else that I hadn't taken myself,"  he said in the same interview.

According to Dr. Klee, the soldiers who participated were primarily enlisted men who received bonus leave time to take part in the research.   Though some "bad trips" had been observed in soldiers following LSD ingestion,  Dr. Klee denied any long-term ill effects,  However,  he admitted there was no follow-up after the soldiers completed their one-month participation at Edgewood Arsenal.    While the army would later admit to administering LSD to more than 1500 people between 1956 and 1967, Dr. Klee denied any knowledge of these later experiments.  He led an unsuccessful campaign to have then-President Richard Nixon renounce the use of LSD as a military weapon.  

Mars or Bust

Wanted:  man and woman for a historic voyage to Mars and back.   Married couple preferred.

When millionaire space pioneer Dennis Tito makes plans, they are definitely big ones.   The 72-year old Tito has already made history by becoming the first commercial space tourist in 2001 when he paid the Russian government $20 million for a trip to the International Space Station.   Now he has unveiled an even more grandiose scheme by announcing a planned trip to Mars in 2018 when planetary alignment is favourable.    “We have not sent humans beyond the moon in more than 40 years,” Mr Tito said in a press conference announcing the planned mission.    “I’ve been waiting, and a lot of people my age, have been waiting. And I think it’s time to put an end to that lapse."

To read more, check out my new Psychology Today blog post. 

The Sex Wars (Part 1 of 4)

Sex education is still a controversial subject today in many parts of the world,   Even in supposedly liberal societies, the amount of information provided to children on sexual development and birth control can spark protests by conservative groups worrying about "corrupting children".   If topics such as sexuality can trigger protests today, you can imagine the difficulties  experts lecturing on public health faced back in the 19th century.

Take early health advocate Sylvester Graham, for instance.    Though he primarily spoke on the importance of chastity and the evils of masturbation, among other things,  his public lectures still drove mobs to protest and verbally abuse the women who dared to attend them.   At one Boston lecture on February 26, 1835,  a witness described seeing one thousand mobbers confronting Graham  "for lecturing to the Ladies alone and not even their husbands admitted!!"     Though the women who attended defended themselves as best they could,  men protested Graham's frank talk on chastity as an attempted infringement on their marital rights as husbands.   

The fact that Graham insisted on segregating his lectures by gender made them even more suspicious since they were unable to hear what he was telling women.   Still, enough information leaked out to spark outrage.   Instructing women to limit sexual contact and deny men the unlimited access they had taken for granted was upsetting enough.   That some women even went so far as to ask advice on birth control during the women-only lectures infuriated them.    While the "rhythm method" is favoured by conservatives today,  recommending it to women during the 19th century bordered on obscenity.

And the controversy was only just beginning.

Marriage Manuals and Free Love

Along with public lectures on sexual health, "marriage manuals" became bestsellers despite attempts at controlling the information they contained.    Since some of these books also included information on birth control, the subject was often explosive, especially since the "Free Love" movement was also gaining traction during the middle years of the 19th century.    A major theme in anarchist literature, Free Love often meant a total rejection of traditional values such as marriage and chastity.  More commonly seen in Europe, Free Love also had its share of American supporters.  

It was one particular supporters, Robert Dale Owen, who wrote the first American pamphlet on contraception in 1831.   The son of prominent social reformer, Robert Owen, Robert Dale Owen embraced his father's views on social democracy.   For him, giving women advice on how to control their fertility was part of that vision.  His pamphet, Moral Physiology; or, A Brief and Plain Treatise on the Population Question, contained frank talk about vaginal sponges and the value of coitus interruptus in preventing pregnancy.  Shockingly for that time, Owen also argued that unmarried women should have access to birth control information as well.   He was still a man of his time, though, and argued against birth control methods for prostitutes or in casual sex. 

One of Owen's Free Love colleagues was even more controversial.   Frances ("Fanny") Wright was a Scottish heiress and an ardent feminist who became an American citizen in 1825.   Along with being a dedicated social reformer and abolitionist, she was also part of the American Popular Health Movement for promoting health care advice.   For Wright, that meant providing women with information about how their bodies worked and controlling fertility.   While much of her advice seems tame today, it certainly shocked "polite society"and many conservatives denounced Wright and the message that she tried to convey.   Long after her death, "Fanny Wrightist" was a slur that later women had difficulty overcoming.  

Even male freethinkers faced legal opposition due to the Free Love association.   American physician Charles Knowlton generated a firestorm of controversy when he published a book titled The Fruits of Philosophy, or the Private Companion of Young Married People in 1830.    Though the first edition of the book was only shown to Knowlton's patients in Ashfield, Massachusetts, it was the second edition of the book published in 1832 that would generate controversy due to its wider circulation.   Along with being an all-purpose guide to sexuality (including advice on impotence and other sexual problems, the also described different birth control methods.   Much as with Fanny Wright's message, Knowlton's insistence that women should be allowed to take charge of their own fertility was enough for him to be charged with obscenity.  

A local minister, Mason Grosvenor, began a campaign against accused Knowlton of contributing to "ifidelity and licentiousness".   The resulting legal storm would lead to Charles Knowlton being sentenced to three months "hard labour" and a heavy fine.    Not being satisfied with the light sentence Knowlton received, Grosvenor filed another complaint against the doctor in Franklin County.   After two acquittals, the charges were dropped and Grosvenor left town.  As for the book's publisher, Abner Kneeland, he would later be tried for blasphemy with Knowlton's book being part of the evidence against him.

Despite Knowlton's legal victory, the battle for public sex education was hardly over.  Though his book enjoyed modest success in the years after Knowlton's death in 1850, other countries still regarded it as obscene.   Which was part of the problem for governments that attempted to ban the book.   The publication of Knowlton's book in the United Kingdom led to a high-profile trial in 1877 of the book's two publishers,  Charles  Bradlaugh and Annie Besant.   The trial publicity turned Fruits of Philosophy into a best-seller (though the readers may have been disappointed that the book was not as obscene as the press led them to believe).   Annie Besant would go on to publish her own birth control manual, along with becoming one of the guiding forces in the Theosophy movement.  

Back in the United States, things were just beginning to heat up.  Dr. Frederick Hollick's public lectures on the "Origin of Life" in Philadelphia generated a new storm.   Not only was he speaking openly and frankly on the topic of human sexuality to a mixed-gender audience, but he actually had a paper-mache model of a naked woman on stage to demonstrate some of his points.   Not only was the model anatomically correct, but Hollick could systematically remove the outer layers as he lectured on the "generative act".   He also described the importance of frequent sexual pleasure for all mature humans, men and women alike.   Needless to say, this was enough to set off the conservatives who, much as they did with Knowlton, accused Frederick Hollick of immoral behaviour.

Not that this reduced the popularity of Hollick's lectures.   Though newspaper editorials at the time reported on how "many have fainted away at first view of Hollick's manikins",  he gave twenty-six lectures in Philadelphia alone over a five-year period.    Joining the popular lecture circuit, Hollick also lectured in Baltimore, Washington, St. Louis, throughout Massachusetts and even on a steamship heading to New Orleans (the other passengers insisted).  

In 1850, Hollick published his own "marriage manual", The Marriage Guide, or Natural History of Generation, which covered all the material he gave in his public lectures but more accessible for a wider audience.  Along with graphic descriptions of sexual anatomy, complete with diagrams and pictures, Hollick also wrote about formerly taboo topics such as sexual ecstasy and autoeroticism.    He also wrote another book, The Diseases of Woman, Their Causes and Cure Familiarly Explained: With Practical Hints For Their Prevention, And For The Preservation of Female Health in 1847.   

Though both books established Hollick as a major authority on human sexuality and sexual health, he was also targeted by Philadelphia's district attorney who charged him with obscenity.  The fact that Hollick was a freethinker and a supporter of Robert Owen likely worked against him as well.  Not that Hollick was entirely enlightened considering that he was openly racist and supported slavery on the grounds of white superiority.    As for his views on sexuality, he was ahead of his time in some ways and very much a man of his time in others.  That included the evils of masturbation or self-abuse (which he argued caused baldness, epilepsy and impotence).  Still, his emphasis on the right of women to control their fertility was part of the "first wave" of feminism that was already underway in many parts of the world.

Ultimately, the rising interest in public sex education would be basically placed on hold with the outbreak of the U.S. Civil War in 1861.    The war years would transform American society more completely than anyone could have imagined.

Continue to Part 2