I realize this is the "corn snake" forum, but since we're talking fiesty, aggressive snakes, let me tell you about my bull snake.
I got him in December. He was around 20" or so then, he's shed a couple times and is quite a bit bigger now. Anyway, the woman I got him from handled him just fine and he would sit in her hand and just chill; she never had any problems with him. When I got him, I let him settle in for a couple weeks, only disturbing his new home to clean and fill his water. Well, every time I would pick him up he would hiss and rattle and try desperately to get away, but never went to strike once he was outside his container. After about a month of handling him a couple times a week, he got no better, he actually got worse in some ways. He would still hiss and rattle but now he had taken to trying to strike as well. He would, sometimes, settle down rather quickly and not try to get away, opting to hide in my hair instead, but even the slightest movement would send him into a panic again.
So, I put a few strands of my hair in his container and continued the handling process as usual... a couple times a week.
He still puts on his show when he's in his container and still tries to get away for the first couple minutes after being picked up but the striking has stopped and he is, overall, more calm.
I don't expect him to ever really be a calm "yes, hold me please" kind of snake but he is coming around.
I would only recommend handlin times of 5 minutes or so at a time, short and sweet.
I'm going to disagree with this, only because of my own experiences and what I have been told by many snake keepers.
It has been my experience that when handling is kept to very short amounts of time and if the snake is put back in its container while it is still very aggressive, frightened, etc. it actually serves to the oppisite of the objective. If you handle a snake for the purpose of getting them accostom to being handled and if you put them back too early, they think they have won the battle with the horrible preditor (you) and thus, were released because they did not make a very good choice for a meal. Thus, they continue that behavior because "it always worked before".
If you handle them long enough (in a quiet place) for them to start calming down and being less deffensive, then put them back, they get the idea that you're not actually going to eat them.
Generally 20 minutes is enough time for them to settle down. Another thing you might want to consider is *how* you are holding the snake. Are you holding him tightly in your hands, away from your body and restricting its movement? If so, loosen your grip on him, bring him into your body and let him slither around on your body, only restraining him when necessary for the purpose of keeping him within a certain area.
Also, don't let a bunch of people handle him until he is more use to being handled by you.
All of the strange scents are just going to freak him out more. Let him get to know you first, then let others, one person at a time, handle him.

I still won't let my kids handle my bull snake because he's just a skittish guy and is super fast. While I'm not at all conserned that he would try and strike at the kids, he *would* get away from them. My MBK use to be as frightened as your corn is when we first got her (as a tiny baby). What I did with her, after she got use to me and was OK with me taking her out and playing with her, I would sit the kids in a circle on the floor around me, let Ketzel (that's her name) loose on the floor and let her go where she wanted to go. If she slithered up one of the kids' pant legs, so be it. If she zoomed across their feet, so be it. I let her get use to the rest of the house hold on *her* terms.

Just some things you might want to try since your guy is so nervous and frightened, but also bear in mind that he may never completly settle down.