A Brief History of Vibrators

The illustrious history of the electric vibrator begins in 1869 with the invention of a steam-powered massager, patented by an American doctor. This device was designed as a laborsaving medical tool for use in the treatment of “female disorders.” Within twenty years, a British doctor followed up with a more portable battery-operated model, and by 1900, dozens of styles of electric vibrators were available in the discriminating medical professional.

Treating Hysteria

What were these esteemed physicians doing with their vibrators? They were treating hysteria—the most common health complaint among women of the day. While the existence of hysteria as a disease was debunked in the 1950s, medical experts from the time of Hippocrates up to the twentieth century believed that hysteria expressed the womb’s revolt against sexual deprivation. A woman’s display of mental or emotional distress was a clear indication of her need for sexual release. Genital massage was a standard treatment for hysteria; its objective was to induce “hysterical paroxysm” (better known today as orgasm) in the patient. Obviously, such treatment demanded both manual dexterity and a fair amount of time, so turn-of-the-century physicians were delighted with the efficiency, convenience and reliability of portable vibrators.

Health, Vigor and Beauty

Ours being a consumer society, the vibrator was soon marketed as a home appliance in women’s magazines and mail-order catalogs. Ads proffering “health, vigor and beauty” promoted the vibrator as an aid to health. By the 1920s, doctors had abandoned hands-on physical treatments for hysteria in favor of psychotherapeutic techniques. But vibrators continued to have an active commercial life in which they were marketed, much like patent medicines, as cure-alls for illnesses ranging from headaches and asthma to “fading beauty” and even tuberculosis!

Ad copy for these vibrators was coy and ambiguous. “Be a glow getter,” one package insert suggests. And who wouldn’t be tempted to experience “that delicious, thrilling, health-restoring sensation called vibration,” when assured that “it makes you fairly tingle with the joy of living!” The vibrator’s usefulness for masturbation was never acknowledged; however, as vibrators began appearing in stag films of the 1920s, it became difficult to ignore their sexual function. Probably as a result, advertisements for vibrators gradually disappeared from respectable publications.

The Adult-Novelty Business - Manufacturing Toys
Sex toys hail from all over the globe. Some of our most popular battery vibrators are manufactured in Japan. Japanese vibrators feature rotating figurines with faces and vibrating attachments shaped like animals—part of General Macarthur’s post-war legacy to Japan was laws forbidding the manufacture of sex toys resembling genitals.

Certain novelty products are made in the United States, primarily rubber dildos and plugs. Most vibrating novelties are made in China, Taiwan, Korea and Hong Kong, where battery packs are produced much more cheaply than they would be in this country. The vast majority of novelty toys are made in Hong Kong, as it’s a huge international manufacturing and export center with few restrictions on trade in sexual materials.

VIBRATING TOYS:

General info

Vibrators Can Be Enjoyed by Everyone

People with disabilities have also discovered the sexual appeal of vibrators. If experiencing reduced sensitivity, the intense stimulation offered by a vibrator can be felt when the stimulation offered by a hand cannot.

For those who eschew vibrators because they’re completely satisfied with their orgasms, we’d like to remind you that variety is the spice of life! Just as your taste in food can change, so can your experience of orgasm. Many women report vibrators make them come more quickly as well as make their orgasms feel more intense. Others find vibrator orgasms less intense. Some men claim vibrators allow them to orgasm quickly, while others find the stimulation too overwhelming. Some use vibrators to create a powerful buildup for an orgasm that they can finish by some other method.

Vibrators Can Enhance Partner Sex

The belief that masturbation and vibrators are just a temporary substitute until a real live body comes along is a prevalent one.

Vibrators Come in All Sizes and Shapes

The penis-shaped, plastic vibrator is probably the most well known model, yet it may cause confusion is also the source of endless confusion and frustration for women hoping to use one to vibrate to orgasm. The dildo shape suggests insertion, but most women orgasm from pressing a vibrator against the clitoris, not thrusting it in and out of the vagina. By learning about various vibrator sizes, shapes and uses, as well as experimenting to find out what kind of stimulation each individual likes, they are bound to find a vibrator (or several) with their name on it.

Vibrators Come in All Materials

Vibrators come in all the materials discussed in the previous chapter – Cyber flesh (sold under trade names Cyberskin, Ultra real, Futuronic, UR3, etc), Jelly, Acrylic, Glass, latex, Silicone, etc
One point to make is acrylic vibes like the slim line vibes are perhaps a little stronger than some jelly models but the jelly vibrators are more comfortable for actual insertion.

Styles and Sources

Vibrators—also commonly referred to as “massagers”—come in all sizes and shapes. Some look like eggs, some like hand-held mixers, some like penises.

Many people confuse vibrators and dildos. What distinguishes a vibrator from a dildo or another type of sex toy is that it vibrates. The vibrator is powered either by electricity or batteries. (Phallic-shaped vibrators can be used as vibrating dildos (i.e., they can be inserted vaginally or anally), but if a person is looking for something penis like, that does not vibrate, they’re looking for a dildo or plug.

Electric Wand Vibrators
Hitachi Magic Wand HRV-250, Adam and Eve Wand Massager and the Wahl Massager
These vibrators run off the standard one hundred twenty volts. The body of the vibrator is attached to a plug-in cord. Most commonly marketed by major appliance manufacturers like Hitachi as “personal massagers,” they are well made (most come with a one-year warranty) with long life expectancies they are widely available as beauty-care products or sports massagers. Because they run on electricity, Electric vibrators tend to be more powerful than their battery brethren, something an individual may or may not prefer for sexual purposes, but which makes them far superior for muscle or body massage.

What they look like: Dubbed “wand” vibrators because they are long and fairly slender in shape. Wand vibrators are usually about a foot long, with a tennis-ball-sized head attached to one end. Most wands have a high and a low speed. Hitachi makes the best quality wand. Because of the rising popularity of wand vibrators in the last decade, you may see cheaper, generic versions of them. These are not as well made and a person will get more bangs for their buck if they stick to the name brands. Many sex therapists recommend pre-orgasmic women purchase a Hitachi Magic Wand because they are so powerful they will be more likely to bring her to climax.

Attachments: Attachments designed to fit over the head of a wand like the G-Spotter are lightweight, vinyl caps, which can be pushed all the way down over the head of the vibrator. We carry a version for each the Hitachi and the Wahl they are usually stocked in the same display as the Hitachi & Wahl. You should always point them out to the customer who buys a massager. The G-Spotter is curved to vibrate against the G-spot area in the front wall of the vagina. When the tip is inserted, the area of the cap below the tip will vibrate against the clitoris, offering powerful simultaneous clitoral and vaginal vibrations!