January 29 in A.A. History

In 1947, at the Alcoholic Foundation in New York City, a transatlantic operator put through a call from Nordholz, Germany, just before 3 o’clock in the afternoon, after arranging the call the day before.  The call came from the base surgeon at a  U.S. Army hospital in Germany. He was concerned about his friend and patient, Captain B., who was also an A.A. member. The captain, it turned out, was in serious trouble. In fact, he had been tried by a military court in Germany and sentenced to be discharged for drunkenness on duty. Would A.A. help?
    The surgeon gave a brief history of his patient. Then he revealed that Captain B. was aboard an Army transport ship scheduled to arrive in New York City at 8:30 a.m. in three days, on February 1. The A.A. staff sprang into action.
    They found an ex-Army officer who agreed to drop everything to help. This found a Catholic bishop, a friend of A.A., who contacted the port of embarkation and found out that the priest there had been chaplain on the same ship, which would allow him to board the ship as soon as it docked. He also found a lawyer who was friendly to A.A. and willing to try to help the captain.
    The A.A. Grapevine reported this story in its March 1947 issue. Captain B. had arrived, the priest had reported that his interview with Captain B. had gone well and he felt that the man was indeed worth helping. Captain B. was awaiting disposition of his case at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey. He was under arrest, but the A.A. secretaries had arranged for visitors to see him. The attorney was waiting for Washington, DC to accept or deny the request. The priest at the port had been in contact with his colleagues at Camp Kilmer. They, too, promised to do what they could for the captain.
    This call from Germany was the first transatlantic call ever received by The Alcoholic Foundation.

 In 2023, in an unprecedented incident, two trustees of the General Service Board (GSB) of Alcoholics Anonymous arrived at a meeting with unsigned letters of resignation. The meeting was a scheduled GSB “planning” meeting with non-board members, and they were not in executive session. The two surprised the non-alcoholic GSB chair, Judge Linda Chezem—as well as a number of other trustees—by asking her to resign; if she refused, they said they would sign and submit their own resignations. After saying that she would resign if the GSB wanted her to, she was asked to leave the room. The GSB—presumably after thorough and fully informed discussion—voted unanimously to accept her verbal offer to resign. They then drafted a letter of resignation for her to sign. When she was called back into the room and asked to sign this letter, she handwrote the phrase “As requested by the board” before signing the letter and leaving.