Lectures at SSAS

Still called the Section on Alcohol Studies of the Applied Physiology at Yale University in 1943, the institution was "engaged in research and teaching on all aspects of the problem of alcohol," commented in the Publisher's Note of the Abridged Lectures of the First (1943) Summer Course on Alcohol Studies at Yale University.

Eight courses of study, which were subdivided into segments, served as the School’s framework in 1943. The eight courses of study included an introductory course; psychological aspects; alcohol and traffic; personality, constitution and alcohol; statistics of the alcohol problem; social measures in the prevention of inebriety; legislative control of the alcoholic beverage trade; and religion and the prevention and treatment of alcoholism. The topics were split into a number of lectures. Representing physiology, medicine, psychiatry, sociology, anthropology, psychology, religion, law, economics, and other related fields, lecturers were selected from the Yale faculty and other institutions of education and public service who had conducted original research on these problems.

The lecturers included Leon Greenberg, Ph.D., a Yale faculty member who moved with the Center to Rutgers, E.M. Jellinek, the Director of the School of Alcohol Studies, Norman Jolliffe, M.D., an Associate Professor of Medicine at New York University, Giorgio Lolli, M.D., a research assistant in Applied Physiology at Yale University, Rev. Francis McPeek, the Executive Director of Social Welfare, Federation of Churches, Washington, D.C., Anne Roe, Ph.D., Secretary, Psychological Section, New York Academy of Science, Harry M. Tiebout, M.D., Physician-in-charge, Blythewood Sanitarium, and William Wilson, Director, Alcoholics Anonymous. (Note: William Wilson used his full name when he taught at the first School; as time went on, he used William W., then Bill W., as he is known today.)

--Adapted from: Summer School of Alcohol Studies (Gail Gleason Milgram, Professor, Emerita, Former Director of SSAS)

Students in the classroom at the Yale Summer School of Alcohol Studies

A group discussion in an informal setting at the Summer School of Alcohol Studies at Yale. Instructor: E.M. Jellinek

Alcohol, science and society

After the first session of what would become an annual Summer School of Alcohol Studies in 1943, there was a strong demand for written copies of the lectures that had been delivered, but only a condensed version of some of the lectures could be made available under the title Abridged Lectures of the First (1943) Summer Course on Alcohol Studies at Yale University.

The following summer, all of the lectures were recorded, and all but four were edited and compiled into Alcohol, Science and Society, including lectures and the discussions that followed them in a single volume. Representing a variety of disciplines—from biochemistry and psychology to sociology and law—that together constituted the nascent science of alcohol, the 29 lectures were reprinted for the next ten years and served as educational materials in college courses and other institutes devoted to examining the problems of alcoholism.

In 1982, Alcohol, Science and Society Revisited was published by the Rutgers Center of Alcohol Studies with the express intention of updating the state of knowledge of alcohol studies.

This promotional flyer shows the Table of contents and the credentials of the lecturers

Cover of the book Alcohol, Science and Society

During the 1944 Summer School, all lectures were recorded, and all but four were edited and compiled into a single volume Alcohol, Science and Society, including lectures and the discussions that followed.

Gail G. Milgram at Rutgers

Gail G. Milgram, instructor since 1980 and director of Summer School of Alcohol Studies and its various iterations (1983-2011) is teaching a class in the mid-1980s.

Raymond McCarthy, an alumnus of the First Summer School

Raymond McCarthy became an instructor, then associate director of the Summer School from 1948 until 1961, and then director until his death. He substantially revised the curriculum to stress graduate-level training.

Students becoming instructors

A photograph of William Leonard (Bill) Keaton, a pioneer (likely the only black pioneer in the country) in the medical management of alcoholism, a graduate of the Summer School of Alcohol Studies.

From the Digital Alcohol Studies Archives

Browse Abridged Lectures of the First (1943) Summer Course on Alcohol Studies at Yale University.
Browse the book chapter by chapter in RUcore, the Rutgers University Community Repository.
Visit the Digital Alcohol Studies Archives