Originally published under the title “Dr. Masserman’s cats” in the magazine Allied Youth, the article will probably leave a bit of a sour taste in the reader today, as it describes animal experiments. The ethics and history of animal testing is a topic unto itself, one that Jellinek’s article doesn’t cover. Instead, he draws parallels between the behavior of inebriated cats and their human counterparts to get his point across to a wide range of lay readers. Jellinek’s pamphlet draws upon Masserman’s scholarly article “Alcohol as a Preventive of Experimental Neuroses” published in the Quarterly Journal of Studies on Alcohol in 1945 that Jellinek not only read but probably also edited at that time.

Jellinek’s point is that, unlike cats, humans possess intellectual and emotional means to figure out their conflicts and make efforts to resolve them.

Jellinek concludes:

“One of the finest ways of preventing inebriety is to develop the spiritual and intellectual assets of one’s personality and to learn how to utilize them.”

The 1951 edition called Of cats and people features a new approach in alcohol education: telling a science-based story with the help of cartoons in a modified comic book. Geared toward young people, but definitely appealing to everyone, Jellinek’s pamphlet predates social media in showcasing content with cat pictures and imparts a valuable lesson about scholarly communication to a public audience: we can have fun and post cat pictures as long as they are related to the topic at hand and in the service of a larger point!