Star Electric Vibrator
name: label: maker
content: Fitzgerald Manufacturing Company
notes: label: Description
content: Patrick J. Fitzgerald (ca. 1879-1961) was an Irish immigrant who formed the
label: Description
content: Fitzgerald Mfg. Co. in 1906, and began making engine gaskets. He also designed the firm’s next important product, the Star Electric Vibrator. This inexpensive ($5) electric-powered hand-held device came on the market in 1919; by 1922, more than a million examples had allegedly been sold. The inscription on this example reads “THE STAR ELECTRIC VIBRATOR / ALTERNATING CURRENT 110 VOLTS / PATENTED NO. 1,327,466 / NO. 487583[?] / THE FITZGERALD MFG. CO. / TORRINGTON, CONN. U.S.A.”
label: Description
content: Ref: Patrick J. Fitzgerald, “Massage Vibrator,” U.S. Patent 1,327,466 (Jan. 6, 1920).
label: Description
content: Ads for “Star Electric Vibrator” in <i>Cosmopolitan</i> (July 1919), p. 151; and in <i>Good Hardware</> (Feb. 1922), p. 116,
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Connecticut, Torrington
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Medicine
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Estate of Carolyn H. Edwards
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: MG.296611.35
label: catalog number
content: 296611.35
label: accession number
content: 296611
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Vibrator
label: Other Terms
content: Vibrator; Medicine
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 4 1/4 in x 8 17/32 in x 9 1/2 in; 10.795 cm x 21.6662 cm x 24.13 cm