May 25 in A.A. History

1925: Bill and Lois W. were five and a half weeks into a motorcycle trip investigating publicly held companies across the eastern U.S. They were staying at “The Camp,” as the Burnham family called it, located at Lake Emerald outside North Dorset, Vermont [left: Lois's father sitting on steps at "The Camp"]. In her Diary of Two Motorcycle Hobos, Lois recorded how “Two tragedies occurred in the insect and bird life today.” She watched with “astonishment” as a dragonfly emerged from the “ugly brown beetle shell” she had found. As it flew away, a phoebe bird “darted down and gobbled it up!” Lois “sat down and cried. Later [that] afternoon, one of the babies of the same phoebe bird fell out of its nest and was killed instantly” [right: phoebe eating a dragonfly].

1962: The three-day Central New York Area Conference began at the Watson Homestead Conference and Retreat Center [left: with commemorative conference coin] in Painted Post, New York.

1989: The four-day 32nd International Conference of Young People in Alcoholics Anonymous (ICYPAA) opened at the Salt Lake City Marriott and Salt Palace [right: aerial view of Salt Palace (left) and Marriott (right)] in Utah, drawing an attendance of 4,000. The theme of the conference was “Carry the Message.”

A.A. History—month and day unknown

1893: An unidentified temperance organization, similar to the Ohio Anti-Saloon League, was established in Washington, D.C. It would join the Ohio Anti-Saloon League to form the nucleus of the National Anti-Saloon League.

1902: Howard Alfred “Al” S. [left] was born in Charleston, Pennsylvania, the son of Emmett Fox’s secretary. After working in advertising and film, he would join A.A. in 1944. Within the Fellowship, he would serve as Director of the New York Intergroup Association, Grapevine Editor (1948–?), a Grapevine Director, and a Class B (alcoholic) Trustee from 1958 to 1961. He would author the Responsibility Pledge, which would be introduced to the Fellowship at the 1965 International Convention in Toronto, Ontario. He would also write the biographical book Bert D.: Hardhat, Inebriate, Scholar, published by Harbor House in the 1960s.

A.A. History—year, month and day unknown

1890s: The National Anti-Saloon League faced significant organizational and financial difficulties. Its founder, Howard Hyde Russell [right], and other leaders were forced to personally solicit funds to support themselves.

1898–99: One Charles Henry S. was born to Jarius A. S. and Jennie D. Horton in New York, the 2nd of four children. [This may or may not be the Charlie Simonson who got sober in Akron, Ohio in May 1937.]