Strange History
I stumbled across this: an interactive, annotated copy of A VEST POCKET GUIDE TO BROTHELS IN 19TH-CENTURY NEW YORK FOR GENTLEMEN ON THE GO:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/documents/a-vest-pocket-guide-to-brothels-in-19th-century-new-york-for-gentlemen-on-the-go
It makes for a fascinating historical read, as well as a the occasional "just how many straight brothels were there in 1800s New York???" comment.
Some highlights from the annotations:
The book states in the introduction that, "we point out the location of these places in order that the reader may know how to avoid them." Cute. "No, officer! I was only in here learning how to avoid being in here!" But apparently there was indeed a running problem with tourists trying to rent a room in what they thought was a hotel, only to get a bit of a surprise.
The census of 1870 listed the occupation of most of the women as "keeping house" or "servant," but a few were listed as working in a "house of prostitution" or "house of assignation."
The houses were officially boarding houses for women. Some of them were technically true boarding houses who let their borders bring men into their rooms, and others were formal brothels with a madam working the parlor and her girls working upstairs.
One of the houses kept a bear in the cellar "but for what reason may be inferred."
One house boasted that it kept a doctor on call.
The book has ads for "Imported Male Safes: A Perfect Shield Against Disease or Conception Made of Both Skin & India Rubber."
The books were sold by a John F. Murray on 57 West Houston Street. There's no record of anyone with that name at that address in New York, and the NY TIMES couldn't find any clues to his real identity, or how he got such an encyclopedic knowledge of the houses.
In 1871, during the trial of a madam who ran a "disorderly house," the judge called on lawmakers to license brothels, "however repugnant to the moral notions of some people such an act of law might be" to make them less of a free-for-all.
The book makes it sound like prostitution in New York was largely genteel, populated by women who were amply rewarded for their work and enjoyed a decently high style of living. The reality, of course, was very, very different. Unwanted pregnancy that ended your "career" and left you without resources to care for your child. STIs in an era before antibiotics. Violence from "customers" that you didn't dare report to the police.
Really, the book encapsulates Victorian attitudes: anything goes as long as it =looks= respectable and you don't talk about the truth.
comments
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/documents/a-vest-pocket-guide-to-brothels-in-19th-century-new-york-for-gentlemen-on-the-go
It makes for a fascinating historical read, as well as a the occasional "just how many straight brothels were there in 1800s New York???" comment.
Some highlights from the annotations:
The book states in the introduction that, "we point out the location of these places in order that the reader may know how to avoid them." Cute. "No, officer! I was only in here learning how to avoid being in here!" But apparently there was indeed a running problem with tourists trying to rent a room in what they thought was a hotel, only to get a bit of a surprise.
The census of 1870 listed the occupation of most of the women as "keeping house" or "servant," but a few were listed as working in a "house of prostitution" or "house of assignation."
The houses were officially boarding houses for women. Some of them were technically true boarding houses who let their borders bring men into their rooms, and others were formal brothels with a madam working the parlor and her girls working upstairs.
One of the houses kept a bear in the cellar "but for what reason may be inferred."
One house boasted that it kept a doctor on call.
The book has ads for "Imported Male Safes: A Perfect Shield Against Disease or Conception Made of Both Skin & India Rubber."
The books were sold by a John F. Murray on 57 West Houston Street. There's no record of anyone with that name at that address in New York, and the NY TIMES couldn't find any clues to his real identity, or how he got such an encyclopedic knowledge of the houses.
In 1871, during the trial of a madam who ran a "disorderly house," the judge called on lawmakers to license brothels, "however repugnant to the moral notions of some people such an act of law might be" to make them less of a free-for-all.
The book makes it sound like prostitution in New York was largely genteel, populated by women who were amply rewarded for their work and enjoyed a decently high style of living. The reality, of course, was very, very different. Unwanted pregnancy that ended your "career" and left you without resources to care for your child. STIs in an era before antibiotics. Violence from "customers" that you didn't dare report to the police.
Really, the book encapsulates Victorian attitudes: anything goes as long as it =looks= respectable and you don't talk about the truth.
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