1932: Let’s Operate [left: cover] by Dr. Roy H.
McKay
[near left: photo; near right: obverse side of photo] and Norman Beasley was published. A review
[below left] in the Journal of the American Medical Association said of the book:It is simple, indeed, for any medical author to exploit the mistakes of his confrères and to exaggerate the evidence of unnecessary operations, fee splitting and other weaknesses that have on occasion been apparent in medical practice. This
volume is apparently a journalistic tour de force. Dr. McKay got important newspaper publicity when he first emphasized these facts and was apparently induced by the publishers to expand his original remarks into a book. This review is written some months after the book was first published, and the indications seem to be that as a sensation the book fell somewhat flat.
McKay would be one of Bill W. and Dr. Bob S.’s early failures in
June 1935, before they met Bill D.; thus McKay missed his chance to become
A.A. #3. He would die before the end of 1936.
1934: The stock market was
closed in observance of Armistice Day, but Lois had to work, so Bill W.
decided to play golf on Staten Island, likely at Silver Lake Golf Course
[right, opening, 20 Apr 1930]. He took the subway to Lower Manhattan, the ferry to Staten Island, and a
bus
[left: type of bus used on Staten Island beginning in 1934] south to the course. On the bus, Bill struck up a conversation with the man
next to him, who was carrying a rifle. The man told Bill he was going target
shooting at a range beyond the golf course. While they were talking, another
bus collided with theirs; fortunately no one was hurt, but the passengers had
to wait for a replacement bus.
Bill’s companion suggested they
wait at a nearby bar. His companion ordered Scotch, while Bill ordered ginger
ale. When asked why he wasn’t drinking, Bill launched into a detailed account
of Silkworth’s theory of alcoholism and his own history with alcohol,
declaring that he could never drink another drop again.
When the
replacement bus arrived, they resumed their journey. The bus reached the golf
course around noon, and Bill’s friend, who needed to change buses, proposed
they stop for lunch at a nearby place. Bill ordered ginger ale with his
sandwiches, while his friend again ordered Scotch.
Bill fell
into a reverie about his first Armistice Day, celebrated in a small French
town. Just then, the bartender offered each of them an Armistice Day Scotch,
on the house. Bill immediately took his and downed it. His astonished friend
exclaimed, “You must be crazy!” Bill assured him that he was. The friend went
on to the shooting range while Bill continued to drink.
Somehow,
Bill found his way to the golf course. However, he kept drinking and played so
recklessly that he was kicked out. He came home at 5 a.m., so drunk that he
fell into the entryway under the stairs and gashed his head. Lois, who had
been up all night worrying, rushed downstairs when she heard the noise. Bill
was on the floor, unconscious and bleeding profusely. As a result, Lois began
looking for a sanitarium for Bill. This binge would last a month.
1939: Bill and Lois W. visited
Clarence S. [right] in Cleveland,
Ohio. This was probably the day of traveling to Cleveland that Lois would note
in her diary five days later
[see later entry for Nov 16].
1940: Alcoholics Anonymous
arrived in Minnesota. Some months earlier, a drinking Pat C.
[left] had gone into the Minneapolis library to stay warm. There he found the book
Alcoholics Anonymous and, using his sister’s library card, took it home. He
soon discovered there weren’t any A.A. groups in Minnesota, so he wrote a
letter to the Alcoholic Foundation in New York City asking for help.
A
month or so later, Chan F. from Chicago received a letter from Bill W.—typed
by Ruth Hock—asking him to call on Pat if he was ever in Minneapolis. Chan and
another A.A. member, Bill F., traveled to Minneapolis to attend a Minnesota
Gopher football game.* A friend of
Pat’s named Alf was at that same game, drunk. As a sober Alf recalled it in
1996:
I can visualize Pat freezing in that little room on Skid row, shaking while eyeing the last inch of Old Grand Dad [sic] whiskey left in his bottle! Only an alcoholic can understand the desperation of that feeling.
On November 11th, the day Chan and Bill were due to leave, the
Armistice Day Blizzard struck Minnesota
[right: 12 Nov 1950 Minneapolis Star Journal; left: photo] and stopped all travel. With nothing else to do, they called around with no
luck—until Pat C. answered. For the next two days, Pat and the two A.A.
members talked about Alcoholics Anonymous. Pat listened, still skeptical that
it would work for him, but eventually he understood the message and stayed
sober from that point on. He went on to dedicate his life to expanding A.A.,
and today there are meetings every day in Minnesota.
consequential games in Minnesota football history. A
record-breaking crowd of 63,894 fans attended, packed together in heavy
overcoats, completely unaware that an unprecedented deadly blizzard would
freeze the entire region on Monday. The game, often called the Mud Bowl, was
played in torrential rain and heavy mud. The defining image of the game was
Bruce Smith’s legendary 80-yard touchdown run, slithering past the defense to
score. The subsequent extra point secured a thrilling 7-6 victory for
Minnesota, who were named national champions at the end of the season [right: image; below: video of game-winning 80-yeard rush by the Gophers' Heisman Trophy winner, Roger Smith].
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