August 26 in A.A. History

1910: William James [far left: 1903], 68, died of heart failure at his family’s summer home [near left] in Chocorua, New Hampshire. He was buried [right: gravestone] in the family plot in Cambridge Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

James had continued to write and lecture, publishing Pragmatism that same year, followed by The Meaning of Truth and A Pluralistic Universe in 1909. He had suffered increasingly from cardiac pain in his final years, and his condition worsened in 1909 while he was at work on a philosophy text, left unfinished at his death and published posthumously in 1911 as Some Problems of Philosophy.

In the spring of 1910, James had traveled to Europe to undergo experimental treatments for his heart ailment. The treatments proved unsuccessful, and he returned home on 18 August.

1935: Bill W. [right, mid-late 1930s] returned to New York City from Akron, Ohio. Reflecting on his journey, he later said,

By the time I got home, I was endowed with a little more humility, a little more understanding, and considerably more experience. Very slowly a group began to take shape.

He began looking for drunks to help at Calvary Mission and Towns Hospital. His first two successes came from Towns Hospital: Hank P. [far left] from Teaneck, New Jersey, and Fitz M. [near left] from Cumberstone, Maryland.^* Bill and his wife, Lois, started a group^† for drunks trying to get sober that met on Tuesday nights in their home at 182 Clinton St., Brooklyn.

Their home would also serve as a kind of halfway house for alcoholics who had nowhere else to go.

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^*It’s unclear who got sober first, Hank or Fitz.

^†This group would later be recognized to have been the second group of Alcoholics Anonymous, after the one in Akron, Ohio.

1936: The New York World‑Telegram published a story about Frank Buchman [right], written by William A. H. Birnie, who had been granted a personal interview with Buchman after arriving at Buchman’s press conference the previous day, after it had already ended.

Buchman and the Oxford Group faced a public relations disaster when other media outlets began quoting only selected portions of the interview, omitting crucial context.

The headline, byline, and first few paragraphs read:

HITLER OR ANY FASCIST LEADER CONTROLLED BY GOD COULD CURE ALL ILLS OF WORLD, BUCHMAN BELIEVES.
By William A. H. Birnie,
World-Telegram Staff Writer

To Dr Frank Nathan Daniel Buchman, vigorous, outspoken, 58-year-old leader of the revivalist Oxford Group, the Fascist dictatorship of Europe suggests infinite possibilities for remaking the world and putting it under “God Control”.

I thank heaven for a man like Adolf Hitler, who built a front line of defense against the anti-Christ of Communism,” he said today in his book-lined office in the [Oxford Group] annex of Calvary Church, Fourth Ave and 21st St.

“My barber in London told me Hitler saved Europe from Communism. That’s how he felt. Of course, I don’t condone everything the Nazis do. Anti-Semitism? Bad, naturally. I suppose Hitler sees a Karl Marx in every Jew.

“But think what it would mean to the world if Hitler surrendered to the control of God. Or Mussolini. Or any dictator. Through such a man God could control a nation overnight and solve every last, bewildering problem.”

The remaining twenty-two paragraphs outlined Buchman’s vision of what a God-controlled country might look like, along with his claim that God could reveal His will to anyone:

The world won’t listen to God, but God has a plan for every person, every nation. Human ingenuity is not enough. That is why the ‘isms are pitted against each other and blood flows.

In his press interviews, Buchman aimed both to share his profound experiences of change and to answer the reporter’s questions. He devoted much of this interview to discussing his personal encounter with the Cross of Christ — a power he believed strong enough to eliminate hatred from his own life, and therefore capable of transforming anyone, even a dictator.

The often-quoted legend from this interview claims that Buchman said, “Thank God for Hitler.” In fact, this phrase was neither uttered by Buchman nor printed in the article. Those present at the interview also insist it did not reflect the overall tone. Garrett Stearly, for instance, recalled:

I was present at the interview. I was amazed when the story came out. It was so out of key with the interview. This had started with an account of the Oxford Group’s work in Europe. Buchman was asked what about Germany. He said that Germany needed a new Christian spirit, yet one had to face the fact that Hitler had been a bulwark against Communism there — and you could at least thank heaven for that. It was a throw-away line. No eulogy of Hitler at all.

Others took a starkly different view. In 2016, a blogger wrote:

Buchman, who had attended Nazi rallies and was Heinrich Himmler’s guest at the Berlin Olympics, was a Nazi appeaser. If his cult had targeted the disenfranchised and disaffected like so many others, this position might not have caused much harm. But Buchman sought and obtained power and influence. Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and his principle [sic] foreign affairs advisor Sir Horace Wilson were both members of the Oxford Group. When Buchman advised giving Hitler whatever he wanted to prevent war, they listened.

1940: Bill W. wrote to Dr. Bob S.:

To say that I am overjoyed with the progress of Alcoholics Anonymous is stating the case mildly. For a long time I was earful that weak situations… would develop in large numbers as a result of publicity and half-baked starts. But even Washington now has a strong group and places that were shaky such as Los Angeles and San Francisco are coming on beautifully both in quality and quantity. It has become evident only with the last two or three months that the casual traveler, the book, and our central office correspondence and “propaganda” is sufficient to spread AA all over the country. That is a demonstrated fact about which I have no doubt whatever. Neither would anyone who has seen the amazing correspondence which rolls into this office. In some instances there has been no personal contact at all—just our correspondence and the book. An increasing number of people are coming to light who have been dry on the book alone. In many instances they have commenced to work with other people. It is all truly miraculous. Considering the amount of attention and nursing and the great difficulty of starting the original groups, it is all quite incomprehensible. Nevertheless, nationwide success is already here. We cannot possibly fail now.

1941: The Cuyahoga County^* Central Committee met for the third time. Their bulletin to all groups announced plans for a Halloween party and a New Year’s Eve party for “all the combined groups,” and inquired if anyone was interested in forming a bowling league. Additionally, it noted the availability of two A.A. pamphlets:

1) the Houston Press articles [above left: the pamphlet], written by Larry J., and
2) the Cleveland Plain Dealer articles [above right: one such article].

This shows that the Cleveland fellowship was actively engaged not only in meetings and Twelfth Step work but also in public relations and social activities.

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^*Cuyahoga County includes Cleveland, Ohio and its surrounding areas.

2012: Московские Начинающие (Moscow Beginners) celebrated its 25th anniversary with the theme “Наша дверь всегда открыта…” (Our door is always open…) [left: meeting room; right: token from the 25th anniversary].