September 30, 1998

You many recall one of the very first stories I wrote at the beginning of this project about the art gallery on the Upper East Side that was selling a ten-inch, erect, mummified penis for $10,000. Apparently a dollar per inch was too much for investors to swallow; at the time of my visit, the gallery had yet to receive a firm offer for the piece.

Well, the other day I was at this gallery near Union Square that specializes in erotic art. I'm not talking about modern day paintings and photos of naked chicks. I'm talking about two, three-hundred year old masterpieces. Delicate porcelain dildos. Pewter candlesticks depicting female wood nymphs simultaneously sticking their heads into each other's Grog Bowl. I mean this was classy stuff.

As on any sales call, a good salesperson will try to make small talk about something of interest to the potential customer. As my long-time readers know, I can talk endlessly about all things dirty; from having one's genitals bound with twine to jerking off in the middle stall in the company men's room.

So, I recounted the story of the mummified penis to the director of this erotic art gallery. She smiled throughout. "So I told the owners of that place on the Upper East Side" I said in conclusion, "that you guys should have that penis cast in bronze. Then you can mount five or six of them to a lacquered two-by-four and sell it as a coat rack. You'd make a killing in Chelsea and the West Village."

The erotic gallery owner laughed at my suggestion. "Come take a look at this" she said to me as she got up from behind her desk and led me to a back closet. When she opened the door, I was greeted by six exact bronze replicas of man-tubers standing at attention. They were lined up horizontally and affixed to a lacquered two-by-four. "I just got this last week" the erotic gallery director said. "Someone beat you to it" she smiled.

The six metal flesh daggers were each twisted slightly differently. I could tell they were not all cast from the same man, as each was different in terms of thickness, length, and veineyness. None of them was ten inches long, so I knew it was not the directors of the Upper East Side gallery who had acted on my suggestion.

As with any invention--like the radio or the light bulb--the idea for the penis coat rack must have been ripening in the minds of hundreds, maybe thousands of folks around the world. Metaphorically speaking, the world was pregnant with the idea. Who would actually be the first to give birth to it was the question. Who had the determination to reach for the golden ring--to make the dream of the penis coat rack a reality--that was the question. Thomas Edison said that "genius was 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration." Well, someone out there had the guts, the drive, and six available penises to get the job done.

Now the world has the penis coat rack. The inventor is making money and the rest of us have learned a valuable lesson about the importance of acting quickly to stake one's claim in this ultra-competitive global economy.

Broadway Jim Jenkins