Nearly 100 years ago, there was no drug to help with erectile dysfunction, but Bernard Scheinkman came up with an alternative. It’s not clear whether this nightmarish penile splint was ever manufactured — but you have to love the baroque logic of combining a cock ring, an open condom and a shelf.
Or maybe this is more like a strap-on that takes a penis for a ride.
The objective of this device, as presented in the patent, was to help impotent men father children.
The present invention embodies a mechanical substitute for the erectile tissue of the corpora cavernosa of the genital organ so that fecundation may result even in the absence of an erection.
A noble goal, to be sure. But does the end justify the means?
According to the description in the patent, a user would press part B against the pelvis, and cradle the penis in the wire-reinforced rubber shaft of part A. Then you would roll the elastic cover (part D) down until your entire unit was covered. A “gripping ring” (C) would sit just behind the glans and “preclude its inadvertent withdrawal.”
The inventor brags that the device is “more efficient and natural in its functioning” than other sex aids available at the time. But one detail in the patent is even more damning of early 2oth century sex aids.
The single splint member A, when arranged along the undersurface, of the organ, maintains the uretheral canal in a substantially straight line, thereby precluding constriction due to kinks or uneven pressure…
OK. I’m not even a guy, and that makes me shudder.