Today in A.A. History—October 27-31

In 2024, the 28th biennial World Service Meeting was held at the Westin at Times Square Hotel in New York City [left: Final Report cover]. The meeting’s theme was “The Three Legacies in the Digital Era: Our Great Responsibility to the Alcoholic Being Born Today.” Seventy-four delegates from forty-nine General Service structures were represented:

Argentina	Australia	Belgium (Dutch-Speaking)	Bolivia	Bulgaria	Brazil	Central America/Southern Zone
Chile	Colombia	Czech Republic	Denmark	Dominican Republic	Ecuador	Finland
French-Speaking Europe	German-Speaking Europe	Great Britain	Greece	Guatemala	Honduras	Hong Kong
Hungary	Iceland	India	Iran	Ireland	Italy	Japan
Latvia	Lithuania	Mexico	Netherlands	New Zealand	Norway	Paraguay
Peru	Poland	Portugal	Romania	Russia	Slovakia	Slovenia
South Africa	Spain	Sweden	Turkey	U.S./Canada	Uruguay	Venezuela

October 26 in A.A. History

In 1937, Dr. Leonard V. Strong [near right], brother-in-law of Bill W. [middle right], married to Bill’s sister Dorothy, wrote him a letter introducing Bill to Rev. Williard S. Richardson [far right]:

Dear Mr. Richardson,
    This will serve to introduce my brother-in-law, Mr. William W—–, of whom I spoke in our telephone conversation yesterday.
    His work with alcoholics appears very effective and I think merits your interest and possibly that of the Rockefeller Foundation.
Your courtesy in seeing him is greatly appreciated by me, and I regret my inability to be present.

    Bill would meet Richardson shortly afterward in his 56th-floor office in the RCA building. Richardson was warmly cordial; Bill described him as “an elderly gentleman who had twinkling eyes set in one of the finest faces I have ever seen.” He showed deep interest as Bill shared his own story and that of the struggling Fellowship.

In 1939 , the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Ohio) published the final article [left] in Elrick B. Davis’s five-part series titled “Alcoholics Anonymous Makes Its Stand Here.” It read, in part,

    It is hard for the skeptical to believe that no one yet has found a way to muscle into Alcoholics Anonymous, the informal society of ex-drunks that exists only to cure each other, and make a money-making scheme of it. Or that someone will not. 
    The complete informality of the society seems to be what has saved it from that. Members pay no dues. The society has no paid staff. Parties are “Dutch.” Meetings are held at the homes of members who have houses large enough for such gatherings, or in homes of persons who may not be alcoholics but are sympathetic with the movement.

			In 1939, the Alcoholic Foundation in New York City, presumably Ruth Hock [far left], wrote a letter to John “Fitz” M. [middle left], a “loner” living in Washington, DC. The letter referred another Washington “loner,” Hardin C. [near left?], to Fitz. Within days, the Washington Group of A.A., the first in that city, will be established out of the contact between these two men.

October 25 in A.A. History

In 1939, the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Ohio) published the fourth article [right] in Elrick B. Davis’s five-part series titled “Alcoholics Anonymous Makes Its Stand Here.” It read, in part,

    What gets the pathological drinker who finally has reached such state that he is willing to listen to a cured rummy member of Alcoholics Anonymous, is that the retrieved alcoholic not only understands what only another alcoholic can understand, but a great deal that the unreformed drunk thinks no one else could know because he has never told anyone, and his difficulties or escapades must be private to his own history.
    Fact is the history of all alcoholics is the same; some have been addicts longer than others, and some have painted brighter red patches around the town — that is all. What they have heard in the “cure” hospitals they have frequented, or from the psychoanalysts they have consulted, or the physicians who have tapered them off one bender or another at home, has 
has convinced them that alcoholism is a disease. But they are sure (a) that their version of the disease differs from everyone else’s and (b) that in them it hasn’t reached the incurable stage anyway.…
    He presents his excuses to the retrieved alcoholic who has come to talk. Can’t sleep without liquor. Worry. Business troubles. Debt. Alimentary pains. Overwork. Nerves too high strung. Grief. Disappointment. Deep dark phobic fears. Fatigue. Family difficulties. Loneliness.
    The catalog has got no farther than that when the member of Alcoholics Anonymous begins rattling off an additional list.
    “Hogwash,” he says. “Don’t try those alibis on me. I have used them all myself.”

October 24 in A.A. History

In 1939, the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Ohio) published the third article [right] in Elrick B. Davis's five-part series, “Alcoholics Anonymous Makes Its Stand Here.” It read, in part,

    The ex-drunks cured of their medically incurable alcoholism by membership in Alcoholic Anonymous, know that the way to keep themselves from backsliding is to find another pathological alcoholic to help. Or to start a new man toward cure. That is the way that the Akron chapter of the society, and from that, the Cleveland fellowship was begun.
    One of the earliest of the cured rummies had talked a New York securities house into taking a chance that he was really through with liquor. He was commissioned to do a stock promotion chore in Akron. If he should succeed, his economic troubles also would be cured. Years of alcoholism had left him bankrupt as well as a physical and social wreck before Alcoholics Anonymous had saved him.
    His Akron project failed. Here he was on a Saturday afternoon in a strange hotel in a town where he did not know a soul, business hopes blasted, and with scarcely money enough to get him back to New York with a report that would leave him without the last job he knew of for him in the world. If ever disappointment deserved drowning, that seemed the time. 

	In 1943, Bill and Lois W. [left] left home for their first major A.A. tour. Bill called it their “trip to the coast” and they stopped in at least three places: Los Angeles, California; Portland, Oregon, where they “looked in on Doc H., an Oregon chiropractor who was struggling with the alkies in Portland;” and Seattle, Washington, where they “first met businessman Dale A. [right], who with real valor was trying hard to hold a small band together.”

    Bill and Lois returned home 87 days later, on January 19.

In 1973, the newly created Trustee’s Archives Committee held its first meeting. The committee consisted of alcoholic (Class B) General Service Trustee George G. as chair, two non-alcoholic (Class A) Trustees—Rev. Lee Archer Belford and Dr. Milton A. Maxwell—and Archivist Nell Wing, who had been appointed A.A.’s first Archivist in the year before.

October 23 in A.A. History

In 1939, the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Ohio) published the second article [right] in Elrick B. Davis’s series of five, titled “Alcoholics Anonymous Makes Its Stand Here.” It read, in part,

    There is no blinking the fact that Alcoholics Anonymous, the amazing society of ex-drunks who have cured each other of an incurable disease, is religious. Its members have cured each other frankly with the help of God. Every cured member of the Cleveland Fellowship of the society, like every cured member of the other chapters now established in Akron, New York, and elsewhere in the country, is cured with the admission that he submitted his plight wholeheartedly to a Power Greater than Himself.

In 1940, Dr. Gilbert “Gib” K., a dentist in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, reached out to the Alcoholic Foundation in New York City for help, becoming the first alcoholic contact in that city.
Gentlemen,

    Recently there has been called to my attention an article which appeared in the May 17, 1940 issue of the “Green Sheet” of the Milwaukee Journal that interests me very much. Several lengthy columns are there devoted to a general description of your unique attack, or rather approach, in the direction: “alcoholism.” Since the common sense method employed by your “Foundation” seems more nearly to solve my own personal problem than any other I have heard of, I am moved to write you for a little further information. Is there an active group or “chapter” located here in Milwaukee whom I might contact? If not, any other details you may wish to offer me will be greatly appreciated.

    In December, the Foundation replied that there was “no A.A. Fellowship in Milwaukee or its immediate vicinity; the closest to you being located at Madison, Wisconsin or Chicago, Illinois.” They invited him to write again if he wanted contact information.

October 22 in A.A. History

In 1939, the first public meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous in New Jersey took place at the South Orange Community Center [right]. Gordon MacD., a newcomer with only five months of sobriety, along with Herb D., had arranged for the meeting space to accommodate the growing New Jersey Group, which then had between twenty-five and thirty members attending its meetings. The meeting was held on a Sunday evening at 5:30 PM and marked the beginning of regular Sunday night meetings at the Community Center. This group, the New Jersey Group, would eventually become the “mother group” for all of New Jersey and later be known as the South Orange Sunday Night Group.

In 1963, alcoholism educator and friend of Alcoholics Anonymous, Elvin Morton “Bunky” Jellinek [left], better known as E. M. Jellinek, died of a heart attack at his desk at Stanford University at the age of 72. Jellinek coined the phrase “disease concept of alcoholism” and significantly advanced the movement towards the medicalization of drunkenness and alcohol habituation. His initial study in 1946 was funded by A.A. members Marty M. and R. Brinkley S.

    According to a 1998 study by Mariana Valverde [right], Jellinek’s study was based on a narrow, selective study of a hand-picked group of AA members who had returned a self-reporting questionnaire. Valverde noted that the study’s findings were only relevant to “the experience of white, male, middle-class alcoholics in the 1940s.” Valverde also opined that a biostatistician of Jellinek’s eminence would have been well aware of the “unscientific status” of the “dubiously scientific data that had been collected by A.A. members.”

October 21 in A.A. History

	In 1862, Bill W.’s maternal grandfather, Gardner Fayette Griffith [left], enlisted in Brattleboro, Vermont, for nine months with his military unit, Vermont’s Company B, 14th Regiment [right: a Company B sergeant, c. 1863], under Colonel William T. Nichols. The unit spent most of those nine months—until July 3, 1863—stationed near Fairfax Court House, Virginia, where they frequently encountered guerrillas and Mosby’s rebel cavalry. They played a crucial role in defeating the Confederate Army at the Battle of Gettysburg.

    When Bill was 16, Griffith would take him to a large 50th anniversary reunion in Gettysburg.

In 1939, the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Ohio) published the first [right] in a series of five articles by Elrick B. Davis, titled “Alcoholics Anonymous Makes Its Stand Here”:

    By now it is a rare Clevelander who does not know, or know of, at least one man or woman of high talent whose drinking had become a public scandal, and who suddenly has straightened out “over night,” as the saying goes—the liquor habit licked. Men who have lost $15,000 [~$350,000 in 2025] a year jobs have them back again. Drunks who have taken every “cure” available to the most lavish purse, only to take them over again with equally spectacular lack of success, suddenly have become total abstainers, apparently without anything to account for their reform. Yet something must account for the seeming miracle. Something does.
    Alcoholics Anonymous has reached the town.

    The publication of this series attracted a surge of newcomers, and soon Cleveland A.A. had more members than both Akron, Ohio, and New York City. Bill W. would later write,

    The Cleveland pioneers had proved… the tremendous fact that A.A., when the word really got around, could now soundly grow to great size.

In 1985, the 8th World Service Meeting (WSM) took place in New York City with the theme “The World Service Meeting Takes Its Inventory.” Thirty-eight delegates attended. Two recommendations for future WSMs were made: 

1. to hold a similar sharing session between WSM delegates and the trustees of the U.S./Canada General Service Board at the Tenth WSM in New York; and 
2. to include a Delegates Only Meeting on the agenda for the Ninth WSM, scheduled for Guatemala in 1986. 

A third recommendation was discussed and forwarded to A.A.W.S. for implementation: that…

    A.A.W.S. prepare a booklet briefly highlighting the purpose and history of the World Service Meeting and include recommendations from 1969 to the present. Recommendations will be updated as practicable, and information about interim meetings will also be included.

October 20 in A.A. History

In 1928, Bill W. wrote and signed a pledge [right] in the family Bible: “To my beloved wife that has endured so much, let this stand as evidence to you that I have finished with drink forever.” This would be the first of four such pledges.

	In 1945, Dr. William Silkworth [left] was appointed as the director of the 19-bed alcoholics’ ward at Knickerbocker Hospital [right] in New York City. This facility was the first general hospital in the city to establish such a unit, having opened it on Easter Sunday, April 1.

    The opening of this ward is significant because, at that time, many general hospitals refused to admit alcoholics directly; their doctors often had to use false diagnoses for admission. Silkworth likely had been involved with the Knickerbocker ward from its inception and would go on to dedicate the rest of his life to treating an estimated 7,000 alcoholics at both Knickerbocker and Towns Hospitals.

	In 1963, Ethelred Frances Folsom [left], better known to A.A. members as Sister Francis—having renamed herself after her favorite saint—died in Litchfield County, Connecticut. In 1926, she had purchased farmland in Kent, Connecticut, and named it Joy Farm. She had later renamed it High Watch Farm [right: part of High Watch Farm], which some claim was the world’s first 12-step treatment center.

October 19 in A.A. History

	1948, Paul H. [left, 1956], a practicing attorney and Rhodes Scholar, wrote to Bill W. [right, 1956], asking him to confirm the details of a story Bill had recounted, which Paul had documented in a memo dated October 12, titled “BILL’S STORY OF THE EVOLUTION OF THE ‘TWELVE STEPS.’”

    On January 31, Paul and Eileen B.,^* had accompanied Bill and his wife, Lois, on a train ride from New York City to Washington, DC. The following night, Bill, Lois, and Paul had attended an A.A. banquet where Paul had spoken about the late Fitz M. [right]. During the train ride, Bill shared a verbal account of his writing of the Twelve Steps. In his letter, Paul reminded Bill,

    I said that this was the first time I had ever heard the story and that I believe it was of sufficient importance to commit to writing. I am still of that opinion.

    Paul enclosed two copies of the memo, stating that if it “needs amplification or clarification, please let me know.” If not, he asked Bill to initial one copy and return it. Paul concluded his letter by saying,

    As soon as we reached Washington… I dictated my version of Bill’s story to Eileen Barrett who agreed with my version as outlined. This memorandum has been compiled from the original draft, which is now before me, and also from a subsequent conversation with Bill.

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^*Ms. B. may have been Paul’s secretary, as he “dictated” the story to her; little else is known about her, although it does seem she was well-known in A.A. circles.

October 18 in A.A. History

		In 1952, The Saturday Evening Post [far left: cover] published an anonymous article titled “I’m a nurse in an Alcoholic Ward” [near left]. The author was Theresa “Teddy” R., a nurse at Knickerbocker Hospital [near right, c. 1940; far right: Knickerbocker ambulance at Knickerbocker entrance] in New York City. Dr. William Silkworth, a colleague, referred to her as a “red-headed powerhouse.” The teaser for the article read,

    The author—a onetime alcoholic—has nursed 5,000 drunks through the fading hours of their most spectacular sprees. Here is what she has faced in salvaging doctors, lawyers, ministers, priests, housewives, and stenographers from drink and the devil.

    In the article, Teddy explained her motivation: 

    After a month of daily increasing happiness I was struck with an overwhelming sense of gratitude. 
    I was grateful to that lonely handful of men who formulated the AA principles of recovery and set them down; grateful to the thousands of alcoholics who, in the face of every conceivable difficulty and temptation, had picked up these tenets and doggedly clung to them, fighting to hang on to their sobriety so it could be passed on to me. I felt I must do something in return.
    When I learned about the A.A. ward at Knickerbocker I knew what that something would have to be. I was a trained nurse. During all the years I had frittered away, that training had seemed meaningless. Now it made sense—I was meant to work in that ward. I bombarded the supervising nurse with telephone calls by day, and prayers to God at night, and three months later I got the job.
    These five years have brought deep satisfactions. I can’t convey how much it means to see the transformation in people. They come to us physical, mental and moral wrecks. They leave encouraged but still uncertain. Then, months later, they come back–bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked, eager to help; job back, family back, going concerns again, ready to pass on, with dividends, what’s been given to them. To know that I had some small part in this rebirth is a blessing far beyond what I deserve.

October 17 in A.A. History

			In 1935, Edwin “Ebby” T. [far left], the man Bill W. [near left, 1937] called his sponsor, moved in with Bill and his wife, Lois [middle left, 1937], at 182 Clinton Street [right: c. 1940, 2009] in Brooklyn.

In 1940, Toledo, Ohio’s first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous took place at the home of Ruth T., located at 2222 River Rd. [left] in Maumee Township. The attendees included Ruth, “Duke” P., who led the meeting, Charlie “CJ” K., Walter C., Chet M., Bill W.,^* Pete B., Ed B., and Ernie G.,^† one of the first 100 members of A.A. All nine had previously traveled to Akron, Ohio, to learn firsthand about A.A.

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^*Not A.A.’s co-founder. 
^†Not the Ernie G. who married Dr. Bob and Anne S.’s daughter, Sue.

October 16 in A.A. History

In 1937, Bill and Lois W. left Akron, Ohio, at 4:30 p.m. and traveled with Sterling P. (who drove) and his wife, arriving in Newark, New Jersey, at 5:30 a.m. on the 17th. The four of them had breakfast at a local restaurant before the W——s took the subway home to 182 Clinton St. in Brooklyn, where they presumably collapsed into bed.

In 1943, nearly 200 people attended the 3rd anniversary of Alcoholics Anonymous in Toledo, Ohio, at the A.A. clubrooms on Superior St. Among them were six of the nine founding members. [Right: article from the Toledo Blade, 18 Oct 1943, p. 20.]

			In 1962, Earle Treat [far left], 62, died in Sarasota, Florida. He would be buried in Oakwood Cemetery in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio [middle left: obituary; near left, gravestone].

In 1971,^* the North Rustico Group, located in North Rustico, Prince Edward Island, Canada, presented Louis H. with an engraved coin [right] to commemorate his one-year anniversary.

In 1976,^* the North Rustico Group, located in North Rustico, Prince Edward Island, Canada, presented Louis H. with an engraved coin [left] to commemorate his five-year anniversary.

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^*One of three things occurred: either (1) Louis H. slipped on the day of his 1st anniversary, (2) at least one of the years reported is incorrect, or (3) at least one of the anniversary numbers is wrong. The period 1971–1976 is 5 years, while a 5th anniversary would come 4 years after the 1st, if without slips.

In 2012, the U.S. National Park Service designated Stepping Stones, the home of Bill and Lois W. from 1941 until their respective deaths, as a National Historic Landmark. The official marker [right] says,

    Bill and Lois W—– lived here from 1941 until their deaths. Bill co-founded Alcoholics Anonymous, and Lois co-founded Al-Anon Family Groups. Their pioneering work advanced the treatment of alcoholism and inspired addiction recovery programs throughout the world.

    The State of New York also erected a similar historical marker outside Stepping Stones [left].

October 15 in A.A. History

In 1904, Margaret “Marty” M. [right, as a debutante, c. 1925] was born to Lillian Christy and William Henry M. in her maternal grandparents’ home on Magnolia Avenue in Sheridan Park, a new upscale neighborhood on the North Shore of Chicago, Illinois. Her family lived just down Magnolia Street. Marty was the oldest of five children. A sister, Christy, was born in 1906 but died within 36 hours. Lillian Christy “Chris” was born in 1910, and twins Mary Elizabeth “Betty” and William Henry arrived in 1918. Young Marty led an upper-middle-class life, attending private schools, traveling extensively, and making her social debut.

October 14 in A.A. History

In 1939, The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a brief and unfavorable review [right] of the book Alcoholics Anonymous, which concluded with:

    The book under review is a curious combination of organizing propaganda and religious exhortation. It is in no sense a scientific book, although it is introduced by a letter from a physician who claims to know some of the anonymous contributors who have been “cured” of addiction to alcohol and have joined together in an organization which would save other addicts by a kind of religious conversion. The book contains instructions as to how to intrigue the alcoholic addict into the acceptance of divine guidance in place of alcohol in terms strongly reminiscent of Dale Carnegie and the adherents of the Buchman (“Oxford”) movement. The one valid thing in the book is the recognition of the seriousness of addiction to alcohol. Other than this; the book has no scientific merit or interest.

October 13 in A.A. History

In 1937, at an “alcoholic squadron” meeting^* in T. Henry and Clarace Williams’ living [right] in Akron, Ohio, Bill proposed expanding the movement with hospitals for alcoholics, paid missionaries, and a book.
    Later, Bill said that after “counting noses” with Dr. Bob and realizing the success they were having, he made this proposal to Bob. While Bob was initially cool to the idea, he found the notion of a book somewhat appealing. Together, Bill and Bob decided to call a meeting of the Ohio members, along with the New York City members Bill had brought with him, to thoroughly discuss Bill’s ideas and take a vote.
    Eighteen voting members attended the meeting. Bill presented his proposal, suggesting that the rich would be willing to fund these plans. But as he made his case, it became clear that the Ohio contingent was not impressed. They preferred to keep things simple, believing that money would create a professional class and ruin everything. Active alcoholics wouldn’t trust paid missionaries any more than early Christians would have trusted paid apostles. Jesus, they noted, did not rely on pamphlets or books; his program was word-of-mouth. Moreover, the publicity surrounding a book would overwhelm them as they tried to answer all the inquiries. After passionate arguments and counterarguments, the group seemed angrily deadlocked, but they reluctantly agreed to take a vote.
    Bill’s proposal narrowly passed with a vote of 10–8 (noting that a two-thirds majority would have required 12 votes in favor). Dr. Bob likely gave his reluctant approval. No one knows for certain who else was there, who voted, or how anyone voted. Bill was in Akron with three members from New York City: Bill R., Sterling P., and Fitz M. If they were present and voted, that would account for 5 votes in favor. If they weren’t there or didn’t vote, 8 more votes would have been needed from the Ohio members. The other New York City members would have been much more enthusiastic.

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^*Note the 13th is only the most likely date, as Schaberg deduces in a footnote to Writing the Big Book on page 27, partly because that was the regular night for the “alcoholic squadron” of the Oxford Group meeting at the Williams’ home; however, it could have been any day between the 11th and 15th.

In 1947, the first permanent Alcoholics Anonymous group in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, held its initial meeting in the deacons’ room of the Independent Hall on Collins Street.

		Attendees included Lillian R. [far left, 1947], a Hollywood movie star on tour in Australia; her husband, Burt McG. [near right, 1968]; Harold J., a local drunk; and Jack O’H. [far right, with his wife], a composer and playwright who chaired the meeting. Two non-alcoholics also attended: Rev. Dr. Gordon Powell [near left, 1947], the Presbyterian minister of the Collins Street Independent Church [below left] (now St. Michael’s Uniting Church), broadcaster, and author; and Norman Ley, secretary of the Independent Church. Harold was elected secretary. This group, known as the Melbourne Group of A.A., met at least once a week for the next two years in Powell’s room in the Independent Hall.

	Three additional weekly meetings soon followed: one on High Street in St. Kilda [near right, 1957]; another near Brighton railway station [middle right]; and one at Talbot House [far right: interior, 1928], better known as “Toc H,” a soldiers’ rest and recreation centre located at 476 Collins Street in Melbourne.