Sex History

I’ve researched and written a lot about vintage nylon stockings over the years because the history of nylon stockings is quite fascinating to me. I’m sure most of you have heard about the scarcity of nylon during WWII — just months after the new invention hit store shelves on May 15, 1940. Even silk stockings, second choice to the preferred fit and feel of nylon, were in very short supply as silk was also used for the war effort and the war itself interfered with over-seas shipments.

...Here, 1942 Hollywood starlet Kay Bensel applied her faux stocking seams with a device “made from a screw driver handle, bicycle leg-clip, and an ordinary eyebrow pencil.”

The Museum of Photography in Berlin has just opened an exhibition of nude photos from the turn of the last century.

Women in Japan's island chain of Okinawa have demanded an apology from an outspoken Japanese politician who suggested US troops there make use of its thriving sex industry.

The comments from Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto came after he said "comfort women" – who most historians agree were pressed into sexual slavery for the Japanese imperial army during World War II – served a "necessary" role by keeping soldiers in line.

"Regardless of whether it is war-time or not, a view to use women as a tool [to let out sexual frustration] is intolerable," said Masako Ishimine, a senior member of a local women's body, quoted by the Okinawa Times, the day after Mr Hashimoto spoke.

"Does he mean women should simply take it because men work hard?"

The outrage came on the day Okinawa marked the 41st anniversary of its reversion to Japan at the end of post-WWII US occupation and after comments on history that provoked ire in South Korea and China.

Up to 200,000 women from Korea, China, the Philippines and elsewhere were forcibly drafted into brothels catering to the Japanese military in territories occupied by Japan during WWII, according to many mainstream historians.

Yes, Virginia, like courtesans who rouged their breasts (or, more accurately, their areolas), flappers heightened the color of, and therefore the attention to, their knees. My guess is though, that they rouged post placement of their stockings.

Sex workers have become much more visible in politics and culture over the last couple of decades. Thanks to a surge of activism starting in the 1990s, memoirs and essays about sex work have become their own subgenre. Even in liberal circles, a lot of stigma still remains, but publicly admitting that you're an escort, stripper, or porn star is a lot more likely to be accepted as a valid choice.

But while the workers have been able to edge ever so slightly into the daylight, the clients have remained securely and silently in the shadows. With their new anthology, Johns, Marks, Tricks, and Chicken Hawks: Professionals and Clients Writing About Each Other,co-editors David Henry Sterry and R.J. Martin, Jr. are trying to shift the conversation to include both sides of the transaction. Sterry, and Martin will be reading at The Booksmith on Haight Street tonight along with several contributors. Sterry, who worked as a rent boy when he was 17, talked to us about sex, money, and how to be a good client.

Click to read the entire interview.