Susan D Jones, Valuing animals: veterinarians and their patients in modern America, Baltimore and London, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003, pp. xii, 213, illus., £33.50 (hardback 0-8018-7129-8).

Abstract

The intertwined histories of domesticated animals, human–animal relationships and veterinary medicine represent a very interesting scholarly field; nevertheless, they have received only limited attention from historians. Veterinarians have written the majority of books on the history of veterinary medicine, however; most of them lack proper documentation and analysis in a broader cultural context. Work on the contextual history of veterinary medicine has only recently emerged. Therefore, this study by Susan Jones is very welcome. Based on a wide variety of scientific and popular sources, she has approached the history of veterinary medicine and the veterinary profession in twentieth-century America from the perspective of changing human–animal relationships, particularly the changing economic and emotional value of domesticated animals. In five thematic chapters, Jones explores a particular group of animals and its role in American society. The chapters deal with crucial junctures at which transformations in animal valuation and the development of the veterinary sciences and the veterinary profession influenced each other: the transition from horse power to motorized vehicles, public health concerns over animal food products, the rise of factory farming and the emergence of companion animal medicine. The final chapter highlights how veterinarians worked during the twentieth century to reconcile animal exploitation with morality. The book also includes a very useful introduction to sources on veterinary history and human–animal relationships. In an original and compelling way the author describes how the relationship between Americans and their domestic animals changed dramatically during the last century. Around 1900, almost half of the population lived and worked on farms in close contact with animals. A century later the population was mainly urbanized, horses changed from common working animals into popular hobby animals, while pets changed from luxury animals for the elite into members of the common family. In the same period a comprehensive infrastructure for animal food production and quality control developed. Some important related issues such as antivivisectionism, animal welfare, anthropomorphism, concern over food safety, and the development of veterinary practices in the livestock industry and specialized companion animal medicine are taken into account. Considerable attention is paid to the role of veterinarians in valuing domestic animals as well as their role in changing human–animal relationships. When working horses were replaced by motor vehicles, veterinarians intensified their activities in making the livestock industry more profitable and created the field of veterinary public health. Later veterinarians paid more attention to the growing number of pets that represented a high sentimental value for their owners, thus creating a “modern pet culture”. According to Jones, veterinarians contributed to and manipulated animal value in order to claim a place as indispensable mediators of human–animal relationships. She argues that veterinarians' contribution to the reconciliation of animal use with concerns about morality “shaped the development” of large-scale production of animals for food and commercialized pet keeping. “Veterinarians have sought to address Americans' uncertainty about the ‘proper’ human–animal relationship as the ideological driving force of their profession. They did not pretend to be philosophers, but operated as rationalists meeting social needs” (p. 3). One could question such an influential and active role for the veterinary profession within social-economic and political processes that determined the value attributed to animals and the development of animal health care. As representatives of a very practical profession, even with a certain aversion to theorizing, most veterinarians operated from an economic rather than an ideological point of view. They simply wanted to make money. One could also argue that veterinarians did not shape Americans' relation with domestic animals but just took advantage of new business opportunities that resulted from social, economic and political change. Nevertheless, Susan Jones has written a very interesting book. It suggests the necessity for an international comparison of the historical development of the veterinary profession, before we can evaluate whether indeed this profession constituted a significant directing force in twentieth-century history in general, and in human–animal relationships in particular.