Practical Birth Control [ For Student And Professional Use Only ]

Description

Scarce early mass market work on birth control “For Student And Professional Use Only”

 

Irwin, Rita and Paolone, Dr. Clementina. Practical Birth Control : A Guide To Medically Approved Measures For The Married. New York : Wiley Book Company. 1943. Second edition.

 

Scarce second edition in dust jacket of Practical Birth Control , the pioneering early work by Dr. Clementina Paolone and Rita Irwin, members of the American Birth Control League. Originally published in 1937, one year after US courts ruled that married copies in New York, Connecticut, and Vermont could seek out professional birth control and birth control information without facing obscenity charges.

Although this copy and its jacket date from 1943, the publisher’s decision to include the “for student and professional use only” warning is indicative of the continued controversy.

Though published after the American Birth Control League merged with Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau to form the Planned Parenthood Foundation in 1942, the text and jacket copy were not updated to reflect this.

Similarly outdated is the section near the book’s end looking forward to the use of X-rays as a method of family planning.

 

8vo, 172pp, tan cloth boards with title, author, and publisher embossed on front and spine. Top spine bumped, wear to bottom board edges. Bookblock darkened. Includes 5 illustrations. Printed black just jacket with publisher’s copy. Wear to edges, tear at spine top with peel toward faces. Back top edge chipped. Minor curl with some soiling top edge interior flaps. Very good in good.

 

If you liked this book, you might also like this scarce pamphlet on autointoxication theory “Human Scrap Heap“.