A massive hair dryer from 1934.
 
Some of our readers will recall a time when it seemed like a good idea to strap a plastic bag to your head (when it was still wet mind you) then hook it up to a large device that would blow hot hair into said bag in order to dry your hair. Sometimes I really do believe it is a fucking miracle that more people born in decades preceding the 1970s didn’t die after putting hot plastic bags on their wet heads. Even as a kid back in the 70s I thought on more than one occasion that I was going to come out with a perfectly red ring around my skull after sitting under a soft-bonnet style hair dryer. But that never happened. Thanks, Mom!
 

A drawing of the first hair dryer invented by Alexandre Godefoy in 1888. 
 
Some of these space-aged looking contraptions date as far back as the early 1920s and could be found in public bath houses. In 1930, German hair care company Wella debuted a motorized dryer that looked like it was straight out of a scene from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (pictured directly below). Others are just too wacky for words but as a girl with long hair—I get it. Before the advent of the hair dryer women would dry their hair by a fire (yikes!) or just let it dry on its own. The first hair dryer originated in 1888 in a beauty salon in France owned by Alexandre Godefroy (pictured above) that attached to a pipe for a chimney or a gas stove and blew hot air through a giant alien-looking metal helmet. In the words of those Virginia Slim ads “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby” when it comes to hair maintenance. Lots of images of far-out looking hair dryers of yesteryear follow.
 

Wella’s first motorized hair dryer from 1930.
 

1920s.
 

 
More after the jump…

 
While not exactly dangerous this early film Satán se divierte by Segundo de Chomón is certainly amusing and a work of art. De Chomón was a Spanish filmmaker whose pioneering work in camera tricks and optical illusions was to influence generations of filmmaker. Many of his “tricks” are still used today.

De Chomón is often compared to that other giant of early cinema Georges Méliès—the great French filmmaker whose works included A Trip to the Moon (1902) and The Impossible Voyage (1904). While there was undoubtedly a rivalry between the two men—with Méliès taking the tape for innovation—de Chomón made his mark by developing a mechanical stencil-based film tinting process that was known as Pathécolor. He also diversified his filmmaking talents into documentaries, dramas and special effects for other directors.

Satán se divierte or Satan at Play aka The Red Specter (1907) is a superb example of De Chomón’s work with its camera tricks—some of which would be later revisited in films like Bride of Frankenstein—stage show magic and beautiful color stencilling.
 
Watch ‘The Devil at Play’ plus ‘Haunted House’ and ‘Voyage to the Planet Jupiter,’ after the jump…
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“Strafraum” (“penalty”). A German illustration of a “spanking machine,” 1930s
 
Now before you read any further into this post, you should know that I’m not at all a fan of corporal punishment. However, I am very much a fan of the great lengths inventors and perhaps sometimes kinky “free-thinkers” are willing to go to when it comes to building an automated contraption that does things that a human would normally do.
 

Illustration from the UK of a “spanking machine,” early 1800s. The clown is a nice touch, yes?
 

“The cane and the whip in the 19th century,” 1899
 
That said, the “spanking machines” you are about to see in this post, probably never became reality. Is it possible some of them were real? Sure, it’s possible. Whatever the case may be, it appears that as early as the 1800s, a great many people from Australia to Russia and of course the UK and U.S. were dreaming up new ways to spank the crap out of people’s asses. Sometimes for pleasure and sometimes as punishment. While the words pleasure and punishment can be interchangeable in some circles (I don’t judge and neither should you), I can assure you that the vast majority of people in the following images don’t look especially thrilled about what’s happening. That said, I’d consider some of what follows NSFW. Which is usually what you’re going to get if the title of a post includes the words “spanking machines.” Duh.
 

The “Rub A Dub Dub” spanking machine. An illustration by fetish artist, John Willie (aka John Alexander Scott Coutts), the founder of ‘Bizarre’ magazine . 1940s
 
More retro spanking contraptions after the jump…

A book cover for a fetish publication called “Dolly Slave” by Carlo, late 1920s/1930s

I’m sad to say that I wasn’t able to dig up much information about the artist featured in this post, a French fetish illustrator from a century ago who went by the moniker, “Carlo.” However, Carlo’s illustrations themselves are very well-known in the world of vintage fetish. His strong sadomasochistic images and bondange-themed drawings adorned erotic magazines and the covers of naughty novels. Carlo’s first illustrations may have been seen in French erotic print as far back as 1909, and he was fairly prolific from about that time, and well into the 1930s.
 

“Slave” a fetish book cover illustrated by Carlo, late 1920s/1930s
 
Here’s what I do know about the somewhat mysterious “Carlo”—he was French and he seemed to be very, very well acquainted with the world of hardcore BDSM. His style is very much in line with another French erotic illustrator who was active at the same time known as “Esbey.” Both artists’ work appeared in several publications put out by Select-Bibliothèque, one of the very first publishing houses to put out fetish-oriented material, as well as other French publishing houses that catered to the thriving fetish community in Paris back in the very early 1900s (”spanking fiction” was especially popular back in those days, mon dieu!).
 

 

“The Dominator”
 
When I first saw Carlo’s work, it was hard to conceive that this kind of high-level kink was a thing so long ago. I mean, we’re not just talking whips, chains and stilettos here (although there is no lack of those accessories, either): Carlo’s world as he portrayed it to be in his illustrations is full of sophisticated bondage contraptions, and S&M gear and scenarios that would make Caligula blush. And if it would make Caligula blush, it’s safe to assume what you are about to see is NSFW.

If this is your kind of thing (I don’t judge and neither should you), try to track down the 1984 book Carlo, by Robert Merodack.
 

 

“The Triumphant Leather”
 

 
More vintage BDSM smut from ‘Carlo’ after the jump…