Co-Ed Prophylactic Rubbers
date: label: Date made
content: after 1953
name: label: maker
content: Nunbetter Products Co.
notes: label: Description
content: This white carboard box originally held condoms. The box has red font on a white background. The text reads "Co-Ed TRADEMARK. PROPHYLACTIC RUBBERS A PRODUCT OF PURE GUM LATEX CONTAINS 1/2 DOZ."
label: Description
content: These Co-Ed brand prophylactic rubbers were manufactured by the Nunbetter Products Company of St. Louis, Missouri around 1953. The box contained six “pure gum latex” condoms, often colloquially called “rubbers.”
label: Description
content: Co-Ed condoms were marketed throughout the 1950s and 1960s.
label: Description
content: Beginning in 1872, the Comstock Act had prohibited interstate commerce in obscene literature and immoral material. Condoms and other forms of birth control fell under the category of “immoral material.” As forbidden material, condoms were rarely advertised openly.
label: Description
content: However, during the early twentieth century, rising concerns about gonorrhea and syphilis led a growing number of public health advocates to call for condoms to be sold to prevent disease. In 1918, a court case in New York, (The People of the State of New York v Margaret H. Sanger) clarified that physicians could prescribe condoms to prevent disease. Named after Judge Frederick Crane who wrote the opinion in the case, the Crane decision opened the door for condom manufacturers to openly advertise and sell condoms, provided they were sold as a disease preventative.
label: Description
content: As was true of condoms sold during the 1950s and 1960s, Co-Ed condoms were marketed as a prophylactic, a device to prevent disease. However, many consumers undoubtedly bought Co-Ed condoms to use as a form of contraception.
label: Description
content: Although this package uses a red font on a plain white background, some Co-Ed Condoms included an image of a university campus. The Nunbetter Products Company may have chosen the name “Co-Ed” because they intended to market these items specifically to college students or the name may have been chosen to create a subtle reference to the idea of a promiscuous female college student.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Missouri, St. Louis
topic: label: general subject association; used; web subject
content: Birth Control/Contraception
label: associated subject; web subject
content: Sexually Transmitted Diseases
label: associated subject; web subject
content: Sex
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Medicine
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1983.0871.71
label: catalog number
content: 1983.0871.71
label: accession number
content: 1983.0871
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Condom
label: Object Name
content: contraceptive, condom
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 1.9 cm x 6.6 cm x 4.2 cm; 3/4 in x 2 5/8 in x 1 5/8 in
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1 5/8 in x 2 5/8 in x 3/4 in; 4.1275 cm x 6.6675 cm x 1.905 cm