Natural Childbirth before Your Eyes! The Complete Story Told in Photographs. [Cover title]

New York: Ben Adler Advertising Service, Inc., (1958). 11" x 8-1/2". 31, [1] pp. Black and white printed self-wrappers, stapled. Scuffing to front cover; two short tears to fore-edge of cover and most leaves, not affecting text. Good. Movie tie-in booklet for "The Case of Dr. Laurent," which promoted the then-newfangled techniques of Dr. Fernand Lamaze as well as the importance of educating expectant mothers to reduce fear of childbirth. The film is set in a French mountain town and stars Nicole Courcel as an unwed mother who bucks local prejudices and accepts Dr. Laurent's (Jean Gabin) training in natural childbirth; she eventually trains the other women in the town and delivers her baby painlessly, convincing both her fellow townspeople and a skeptical medical review board of the success of the new method. In addition to a 15 pp series of captioned movie stills charting the plotline of the film, the book includes an 8 pp section of photographs showing Courcel demonstrating exercises for pregnant women and new mothers, as well as tips for parents and excerpts from a 1956 speech by Pope Pius XII quelling moral concerns about natural childbirth (which the pope blames on "associations of ideas created by surroundings" rather than biblical teachings, natch). Oddly scarce. OCLC locates only three holdings of this booklet.