February 26 in A.A. History

1940: Bill W. replied [below left] promptly to John D. Rockefeller’s letter dated February 23, in which Rockefeller expressed his regret for being unable to attend the dinner he had planned to host for A.A. (his son, Nelson, hosted in his stead).

Dear Mr. Rockefeller:
    On an occasion such as this one can seldom write as deeply as he feels.
    You and your friends have offered us the finest thing you could ever give—your confidence. To merit this trust, to meet the responsibilities, to fulfill the purposes implicit in that evening at the Union Club is our great desire. In no other way shall we ever be able to thank you.
    I hope you may always depend upon us for a good measure of discretion, true humility and simple faith in The Great Physician who has already brought us so far.

Sincerely yours,      

<signed “William G. Wilson”>
Wm. G. Wilson       
for            
Alcoholics Anonymous    

1962: Warren C., a merchandising manager for Superior Dairy Co. in Canton, Ohio, shared his A.A. story at the Kiwanis Club in Dover, Ohio. The next day, his speech was published in The Daily Reporter, Dover's newspaper, on the bottom of page 1, credited to him by his full name, under the title “Don't Fluff Off The Alcoholic!” [right].

1999: Felicia G. [left], author of “Stars Don’t Fall” in the 2nd and 3rd editions of Alcoholics Anonymous, died at the age of 93. Born in 1905 in Blansko, now part of the Czech Republic, she was the daughter of the fortune-seeking Polish Count Józef G. and Chicago newspaper heiress Eleanor Medill Patterson, the granddaughter of Joseph Medill, founder of The Chicago Tribune.
    In 1908, her mother took her away following a violent altercation with her father, who later kidnapped her from London and placed her in a Russian convent. Her return was secured with the assistance of President-elect William Howard Taft and Czar Nicholas II.
    Referred to as the ”little Countess” by the press, Felicia married (1) Andrew Russell Pearson—better known as Drew Pearson, a prominent American columnist recognized for his syndicated column “Washington Merry-Go-Round” and his NBC Radio program Drew Pearson Comments—in 1925, but she divorced him three years later; (2) Dudley de Lavigne, an impoverished insurance broker, in 1934, a marriage that lasted less than a year; and (3) John Kennedy Magruder, a landscape architect, in 1958, whom she divorced in 1964.
    Throughout most of her professional life, she used her maiden name. In her later years, she contributed to American magazines and newspapers, lived in New York and other locations, and wrote novels and short stories. In her 1939 novel Flower of Smoke, the Austrian-American heroine famously proclaims, “Make your own peace, no matter what.”