Updated 3 July; more on 9 July
Listen
to MUM director Harry Finley carry on about men and menstruation,
the MUM museum in his basement, toxic shock, etc., on the Keeper menstrual
cup site. No, they didn't pay me.
ABOUT MUM (MUseum
of Menstruation):
"May God close your horable museum."
From a letter, with original spelling, to
the Museum of Menstruation, from "Shocked, by women," mailed from
Cheyenne, Wyoming, U.S.A.
"Consider how Surg. Gen. Koop changed the
country! . . . Carry on!" Judge Giles S. Rich (retired), United
States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Washington, D. C. (from
a letter to me)
Comments from TV, online and other media about this museum.
Three listeners' comments (more) from my half-hour interview with Howard
Stern (here):
° "Get a life, creep."
° "[I] am quite familiar with the obstacles
to a frank and intelligent discussion of menstruation." (Nancy
Freedman, author of Everything You Must Know About
Tampons, 1981)
° "I was just listening to your interview
with Howard Stern. You handled yourself very well with him. He lambastes
just about anyone with a peculiar interest, but you had him very much in
check. I was amazed!"
"Stick to jock itch products, buddy."
In a commentary about the museum and its creator in the defunct Sassy, an American magazine for teenage girls.
"Terrifically diverse" - The Independent on
Sunday (London, England)
"It's fabulous that somebody out there is
willing to . . . pull back the curtain." Mona Miller, national
media relations director of the Planned Parenthood
Federation of America, discussing the museum in The
Prince George's Journal, Maryland, U.S.A.
"One of the best on the Internet"
- Britannica.com
"This gem
of a website is a virtual repository for everything
you ever
wanted to know about women's periods." - New
Scientist magazine (United Kingdom)
"More interesting than you might think. .
. . lively." The V Book: A Doctor's Guide
to Complete Vulvovaginal Health, by Elizabeth G. Stewart, M.D., of
Harvard medical school and Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston.
More media on MUM
|
Current articles & news below
Another contribution to
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
Original museum contributions resume 9 July
The Modern Period:
Menstruation in Twentieth-Century America
The excellent
new book by Lara Freidenfelds.
Don't waste your time reading my review
- buy it!
New contribution to
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
The comments, corrections
& humor astute & generous folks contributed
this week I will put on the site next week.
I'm reviewing a book for this site so I'll post new items here
18 June. Thunderstorms the past 2 days &
continuing now
have already blown a transformer down the street,
cutting off my power and erasing some of the MUM update so I'll
see you la- BOOM! -ter.
Always menstrual pad folder
for girls, 1993
"For countless women across India who don't even have enough cloth
to cover their bodies, menses is a monthly disaster
in the absence of adequate clean cloth."
See the good work in India enabling women to
use menstrual pads
"Virtual Reconstruction Of A Neanderthal
Woman's Birth Canal Reveals Insights Into Evolution
Of Human Child Birth"
Read the short article.
Ethereal white folks in a puberty booklet
for mothers of girls:
How shall I tell my daughter? (1968)
Another contribution to
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
New Scientist magazine on a roll:
"Everything you always wanted to know about female
ejaculation (but were afraid to ask)"
&
"Six things science has revealed about the female
orgasm"
"Contraceptive Sponge Makes a Return
to Pharmacy Shelves"
More
at the New York Times.
Girls' & boys' puberty booklet from Tampax:
"Q girls & boys A," (1987)
New words and expressions
about menstruation from
French Canada (Quebec):
Etre sur ma semaine
/ avoir ma semaine
Etre menstruée
New contribution to Would you stop menstruating if you could?
"Higher Prevalence Of Early Onset Of Menstrual Periods Among Survivors
Of Childhood Sexual Abuse" More.
"Traditionally, . . women have been constantly under
the influence of a hormone [oxytocin] that promotes selective
social memory, and women seem often to be the
keepers of positive social interactions and the initiators of diplomacy
and peace-making." Much
more, also about the baleful influence of birth-control
pills, which suppress oxytocin.
"Genes That Influence Start Of Menstruation
Identified For First Time"
More.
Do fish bite used tampons?
"MUM.ORG is very interesting.
"Have you ever heard of anyone using used
tampons or pads as fishing bait?
"I have heard that fish are extremely attracted to
male ejaculate and could imagine the same for menstrual flow.
With fish attracted to blood and scents it would make sense
to me.
"I could imagine a cooperative wife dropping used tampons
into a ziplock bag and letting hubby freeze them until the next fishing
trip. I assume as they defrost he could cut them
up into nonrecognizable chunks.
"Thank you,"
Rubella tampon (1973) with an ad:
The French were not afraid of the measl-, er,
red
in menstrual advertising:
Fanni Fazekas changes a painting, Red Rain,
in her Art of Menstruation
Three more of you write about
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
The first Social Entrepreneurship Fellow from
Harvard Business School uses her $25,000 prize
to start Sustainable Health Enterprises (SHE), which
enables girls and women in Rwanda to use cheap,
locally made
pads for menstruation so they won't have to miss work and school. Read about
winner Elizabeth Scharpf here.
(Thanks to Prof. Elizabeth Kissling for the
info.)
Read about & see two similar projects in
Rajasthan, India, (partly supported by the MacArthur
Foundation) & in Uttar Pradesh,
India.
The Times of India says,
basically, that these organization and I should mind
our own business.
E-mail update from Duncan McLeod:
"The duncan guy band has moved the Menstral Album
over to the band site. Your community can get the lyrics
on that site and we will have song clips up
soon. We are still getting a lot of requests for these songs live and the
on-line community continues to support them - I guess
women are still menstruating.
"Thanks for your support and if you want to change to a link that
works it is now under: www.duncanguyband.com
"
Join a MIGRANE HEADACHE study!
"In the past I've gotten several participants for each study from your
referrals [from MUM, this site] & now I'm doing a small study with a
pilot educational intervention -- a major focus of this study is menstrual
migraine. . . . The web site for our new study
is https://cfusion.sph.emory.edu/migraine2/
"
Margaret Moloney, RN, PhD, ANP
Associate Professor
Byrdine F. Lewis School of Nursing
Georgia State University
Stems, x-rays, the finder of the G-spot &
HEATING TESTICLES:
More from
Dr. Robert Dickinson's
Control of Conception (1931/32)
The most important sex researcher before Kinsey,
artist & doctor Robert Dickinson, describes contraception
and MUCH else in his
Control of Conception (1931/32)
New Words and expressions about menstruation:
(all U.S.A.) I'm rejoicing in my womanhood. - I have my girl thing.
- Well, your little plan failed this month. - Your vagina is emo!
Humor from Mr. P. Farthingale Bloom
The writer who made suggestions about the
What did women do about menstruation in the past?
page: PLEASE RE-SEND YOUR MAIL!
Dr. Pierce to you:
SHOVE IT!
Read about this in his
Ladies Note Book and Calendar (1914)
Boys needed to know about Women's Mysteries:
"For boys: a book about girls" (1981/87),
a booklet from the company that made Modess menstrual pads
The guys at a pharmaceutical firm wane poetic:
"You are a woman. Your body curves . . .your
skin is soft . . ."
Read the Norforms booklet from Norwich Pharmacal
Co., 1968
New
Words and expressions about menstruation
from India: The crow has touched them, Baith Jana, Mahwari, &
Maasik Dharm
A MUM visitor writes,
Hello, Mr Finley,
The people at this website
are apparently planning to sell a USB flash drive
housed in a tampon (it's at the bottom of the page in the "Coming
Soon" section). It comes in "Regular," "Super,"
and "Ultra."
In spite of the name, DYKON is a contraceptive
jelly from the 1930s.
What contraceptives could you buy in 1957?
Read the sometimes funny list.
Finally, read what you can do to
prevent and cure FEMALE TROUBLES!
Read Gilbert Thayer's Special Book for Women,
probably from the 1920s. Some are very up to date.
Articles continue below the ad(s)
Current articles & news below
Early sex researcher Clelia Mosher, M.D., corrects
myths about women in
Woman's Physical Freedom (1923)
She adds diaper, plug,
and not a good day to
Words and expressions about menstruation.
"I am quite sure you have received numerous answers to the name
of the 'weed' that provided fluffy material to use for menstrual pads in
the days of long ago ( maybe even today for rugged ' ladies of the woods'?
). The wild weed is assuredly what is known as Cat Tail or Cattail. They
grow wild near water sources ( most often ) such as streams, lakes, etc.
Just wanted to help.
****, North Carolina"
"My periods are not heavy or painful but they make me feel so dirty and vile I just cry and cry for hours."
And more of her mail at
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
New words and expressions about menstruation:
Tetherball, from 8th graders: "It
works perfectly and the guys have no idea what we're talking about!"
More.
The matron saint of the pharmaceutical industry
takes you on a tour of New England in
Mrs. Lydia Pinkham's
Landmarks of New England
You think WE have problems? Kimberly-Clark's
(Kotex) employee publication Cooperation
during the early Great Depression (1931-34)
She drew Dick and Jane and
made illustrations for this Lydia Pinkham patent medicine booklet
The Happy Baby
Smyle! It was Nice to have a Pro-Fo
Lactic!
Interesting names for contraceptive & anti-STD
products from the 1940s-1960s. (Start here.)
A woman comments about boric
acid, childbirth and Intelligent Design:
"I think a woman's physical makeup proves that there IS
an Intelligent Designer, because there is no physiological reason
for labor to be painful, or for childbirth to hurt (with the exception of
IF the perineum is torn.)" More.
Modess menstrual pads produced this leaflet for women (1967)
with advice for new mothers after childbirth, &
information about menstruation & hospital-size
pads (really big ones!), & household tricks.
The company that brought you Kotex & Kleenex
also brought your forebears this antiaircraft gun!
Kimberly-Clark company history (through 1947)
Four men and a Machine (1947)
More comments added to
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
Modess menstrual pads produced this leaflet for women (1967)
tied to a famous ad campaign.
An early American gynecologist discusses
his discovery and includes many patient
stories in his
(Dr. Alexander Skene's) Diseases of Women (1892)
Easy-to-make Christmas slippers!
Redheads
and menstruation - a connection?
The little pad for between lips of the vulva: inSync
Miniform
Promotional package, 1997
Two new views on
Would you stop
menstruating if you could?
Humor and a
question for YOU.
She's trying to get her boyfriend
to look at MUM.
The maker of the Keeper menstrual cup shows
photos of what you use in menstrual products
compared with one little Keeper.
Preparing for Your Daughter's First Period
at Harvard's
health site
"Fertile women more open to corny chat-up
lines"
Read
the story!
"Ecstasy over G spot therapy"
"It has evaded lovers for centuries, but in February we learned
that the elusive and semi-mythical G spot had been captured on ultrasound
for the first time." Read the story.
And read about it here on MUM.
Drug Maker Said to Pay Ghostwriters for
Journal Articles
[favorable to its female hormone replacement therapy
Prempro]
Story
FINALLY COMLPETED
the museum's Tassette material (unless I find more
in the thousands of items not on this site)
Prospectus & other material about the first
modern American menstrual cup:
Tassette (1930s-1960s)
More advice to teenagers in 2 ads from Kotex
during and right after World War II.
What's a cleaning lady doing in an elegant
Modess
menstrual pad ad?
Well, she isn't, she's . . . (click!)
Kotex explained why dumping water on your date
was INCORRECT
in an Are you in the know? ad from 1954.
New in Words and expressions
about menstruation:
Gruesome week
and Red storm rising
More stories from you about
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
"Brain
flip helps to relieve pre-menstrual stress
The female brain has a clever way of mitigating the stress experienced during
menstruation: it flip-flops."
Read
more.
Kotex instructed mothers how to handle
NAUGHTY GIRLS
and girls how to handle
NAUGHTY BOYS
in 3 ads from the 1940s.
Kotex taught teens how to deal with
STUPOR-MAN
and difficult situations in 3 ads from 1945-46.
Proposals for sex education in America
right after the Second World War:
How Can We Teach About Sex?, 1946
Giving pleasure to cure disease
courtesy of your doctor, 1890s, U.S.A.
New Hormone Data Can Predict Menopause Within A Year.
Read.
The George Bush you never knew - you betcha
Secret & illegal birth control in the Great Depression:
The manual
New Knowledge for Women (1933)
A tampon
from right after World War II
More stories about
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
Uterine Jihad "It's a euphemism for
menstruation, particularly one with bad cramps. I don't know the origin,
but I've seen if floating around a few message boards for a couple of years
now."
Read more words and expressions
about menstruation
Women have a higher-pitched voice two days before
they ovulate and during ovulation. And that's not all that makes
them more attractive: their skin color becomes lighter,
certain body parts become more symmetrical - and men find their body odor
and face more appealing. All this from an article unfortunately in
German (here)
but find the voice study in an article from UCLA researchers in "Biology
Letters" of the British Royal Society.
Is Tampax telling its customers to Go fly a kite?
I don't think so. Tampax new ad campaign folder,
1967, with 7 new ads.
"Study says women on [The Pill] may sniff
out wrong mate"
"In its effort to prevent pregnancy, the pill alters a woman's sense
of smell, which is one of the ways she decides, consciously and unconsciously,
which men she is attracted to. When on the pill, she is attracted to men
with similar genes, the study revealed. With these men, she is more likely
to have a miscarriage or a baby who has a compromised immune system, or
suffer from infertility. When she is not on the pill, her nose tells her
to choose men who are genetically dissimilar, which increases her chances
of producing a healthy child. It is Survival of the Fittest 101."
More
at the Baltimore Sun.
Oh, no, the tampon deodorant doesn't work!
Just joking.
Tampax new ad campaign folder, 1966, with 6 ads.
A Procter & Gamble tampon from the Sixties
before Christian groups charged the company
was tied to the Church of Satan (because of
its logo, also on this box)
Two more replies to
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
The New York Times quoted from your e-mail about stopping menstruation for an article on menstrual
suppression in the 14 October 2003 edition, Science Times section (online here).
"My Aunt Flo from Red River is visiting."
"My Expression for Menstruation is something I've borrowed from others
and tried to add to. I say, 'My Aunt Flo from Red River is visiting.' And
if it's a particularly heavy or uncomfortable flow, I add, 'And I have to
go to the train station to pick up all her baggage.' That basically says
it all." (More Words
and expressions about
menstruation)
"First let me tell you that yours is a wonderful site.
Love the cat info too! . . .
"Your website is wonderful. It's
so sad that menstruation is once again being demonized. I can't believe
it is safe to suppress your periods and all this crap about breakthrough
bleeding is strange. Isn't it still a period if it has the same flow and
length? Only in America could we see such stupidity
and prudishness brought to such heights. It's a shame everything
that was brought up in the late 60's and 70's is now gone."
Leonardo turns in his grave
"Hi Harry! I was visiting Dave Barry's blog recently and I clicked
a link
that led to this item which is up for auction on E-bay. It is a tampon
Mona Lisa." [See more Art of menstruation.]
Klick your heels together for Cellopon tampons!
No, wait, that's a schematic view of the vagina!
Sorry.
More about Japan's Cellopon (1968)
A competitor of Kotex's Life Cycle Library?
Chapter 4, "A Girl Becomes A Woman,"
from The Life Cycle Library
(the Parent and Child Institute, 1969)
It's a Woman's World,
menstruation information booklet from Tampax (1980s?)
Well, in emergencies this was better than a sock, I guess:
Compad compressed pad & belt, 1940s-1960s?
Dealers' cartons of boxes of Wix
tampons, 1930s-40s
"Stem cells from menstrual blood save limbs"
"Stem cells derived from human menstrual blood have, in mice, prevented
limbs with restricted blood flow from withering. Trials in humans facing
amputations are expected to start next year."
More.
Counter display for the first successful Kotex
tampon,
1930s-40s?
A little Lysol with your tampon? No? Well,
how 'bout hydroxyquinoline from the same company??
Sure, on
F & L New Improved Tampons (1930s-40s)!
Sta-Pacs, a 1930s Tampax rip-off?
Brazilian TV Humor
I tried to finish this update but a car killed Max,
my oldest and favorite cat, this morning. I hope to have an update this
Sunday, 10 August.
Are you gasping at another picture of ripped
American Olympic swimmer DARA
TORRES or just another Englishman in women's underwear?
Curses, see
for yourself!
More Words and expressions
about menstruation:
The Axe wound: "This one is my favorite. My brother came up
with it. He calls it ... The Axe Wound."
periods and puberty: a practical guide for girls
(from Always pads, 1987)
Miss Buchholz needed Lydia Pinkham's Vegetable Compound
after 13 years of
EXAMINING MEN'S UNDERWEAR!
Read about more troubled ladies in the Pinkham company's "Stretching Your Dollar" (1920s).
A pill to make you a lesbian??
Wow, American enterprise at work!
So, what's so FUNNY about TV
ADS for pads and 'pons??
This Australian program shows you!
Is it right to tax menstrual products?
Help this tax payer learn more.
The Art of Menstruation:
Two more pictures by Dr. Nelson Soucasaux
Take THAT, fatness and falling wombs!
Oh, and take Lydia Pinkham's Vegetable Compound.
And read her Home Exercises!
"Care for a slice of spice cake with your douche, Ma'am?"
Read the Lydia Pinkham Come into the Kitchen
recipe 'n' hygiene booklet, about 1930.
"Complex Changes In The Brain's Vascular
System Occur After Menopause
" In a new study, researchers at the University of Missouri have discovered
significant changes in the brain's vascular system when the ovaries stop
producing estrogen. MU scientists predict that currently
used estrogen-based hormone therapies may complicate this process and may
do more harm than good in postmenopausal women." Read
the article.
"Hormone Disorder May Contribute To Lack Of Menstruation
In Teenage Athletes
"ScienceDaily (Jun. 17, 2008) - Researchers from Harvard
University have found a way to predict which teenage female athletes will
stop menstruating, an important risk factor for bone thinning, according
to a preliminary study.
"Amenorrhea, or absence of menstruation, occurs in as
many as 25 percent of female high school athletes, compared with 2 to 5
percent in the general population, . . ." Read
complete article.
Does the moon influence menstruation?
A Harvard medical school professor and MacArthur Award winner writes - it looks that way.
How did women get rid of used pads
and rags in the past? A reader writes.
"Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome Linked
To Irregular Menstrual Cycles, Premenstrual Symptoms In Women" More.
A woman visitor likes this museum
"I think the website is great!
"I think young girls who are SO
EMBARRASSED about getting their periods and talking about it need to
realize that EVERY woman on this earth has to deal with it also, and that
there IS humor in it too.
"They need to see the website."
Another contribution to
Would you stop menstruating if you could?
"Irregular Menstrual
Cycles In Teens May Be Warning Sign Of Bulimia" Whole
article.
Does estrogen make women want to feel powerful
and have control? Maybe.
Daints tampons (1930s),
"For the Woman of Charm"
Lil-lets mini tampons ad from the U.K.
Nikini menstrual panties ads from England
EZO, a Tampax knock-off for Hollywood actresses?
Many new words and expressions
about menstruation:
TNSFF, ragdoll,
What a bloody mess! shark
bait, chumming the waters, dying
the beard red, I'm a ragdoll. (read
the users' thought processes.)
Black & red cans containing contraceptive
& menstrual sponges
(American? First half of the 20th century?)
The Art of Menstruation: Megan Morris
A contraceptive/menstrual sponge in a cardboard
box
"Hi,
"I'm an Irish teenager and thought you'd like some more
expressions used in Ireland.
"Most common are euphemisms like 'I've got woman things/the
woman thing', 'I'm not able to swim', 'I've got my flows' or 'I've got my
flowers.' Some men refer to menstruation as 'Munster playing at home' (a
reference to the red colours employed by the Munster rugby team). In the
Irish language menstruation is most commonly referred to as 'ta cursai mna
agam' (I've got woman things- the word 'cursai' is ambiguous but generally
means events). Also heard are 'i got/have my friend', 'I've the visitor'
and 'I'm menstruating/ have my menstruations' is becoming quite popular
when referred to in a kind of playful way. It also has to be pointed out
that verbal flexibility is highly prized and phrases vary hugely from person
to person."
Music & curing women, men and hogs:
"The stomach of a hog needs cleaning out once
in a while . . . ." You do too!
Find out how in The 20th Century Song Book (1904)
from the Chattanooga Medicine Company
Red dragon
"I have one that I didn't see. My good friend who's a guy always refers
to it as the 'red dragon.' Red as in blood and dragon as in the girl's temperament
at that time."
Read more
Words and expressions about menstruation
Stress worsens endometriosis
Read
a study.
EEEK! What's a man doing here? Why, this eighty-year-old
is attesting to the effectiveness of Black Draught in
Home Treatment for Women, probably before 1920.
New menstrual cup (What are cups?)
Hi, I love your site and I am a cup user. I just heard about a new brand
of cups that is one the market (I believe in Finland. [It looks to me to
be the Czech Republic.]) The website is http://www.ladycup.eu/.
They just came out in January.
Thanks for your website.
****
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