The Birthplace of AA – A History Workshop – Part 1 of 3 – Gail T.

Good morning, everybody. Is this on? Is this on? Can you hear me? Okay. Good morning. My name's Gail and I am an alcoholic. And I'll have some slides here to prove that in a little bit. Picture is worth a thousand words. And because I do the technology, it's a little more than just saying the serenity prayer. I want you all to share in the gratitude that I have this moment that the computer is working. We spent five hours last night. And up until the time spirit arrived, nothing was working. And God just waits to the last minute, doesn't he? Talk about living in the now. But everything's up and running. And I have great gratitude that I think we're going to be able to, I'm going to share some of Akron with you. I am bipolar. I now go back and forth between the north and the south. I think they have a few snowbirds in the room. I did say the serenity prayer a lot, but it never got rid of the cold and the gray skies up north. And so when I retired, I am from... Do we have anybody here from the villages? Because I'm a villager now. There we go. Okay. Okay, I'ma villager. Now, I''m very happy to be that, but I do go home to our home. You know, I hated Akron, Ohio. I thought it was part of the reason why I drank. I was a good victim, and I blamed it on Akron. And I sobered up, fell in love with Alcoholics Anonymous, and found out it was the birthplace of AA, which I share with you because it's your birthplace too. So I'm bringing as much as I can to you of Dr. Bob's house today, and we start off with it being the 100th birthday. And I'm going to kind of mix my story in with the history of the house because it is intertwined, and you'll know me a little better by the end of this slide show. So happy 100th birthdate of Dr., Bob's House. Yeah, thank you. You're kind of a part of it. This is the first kickoff. And by the way, Florida, I've asked for some pictures to be taken. I want to take this. I am a member of the board currently, and I want our board to know what Florida did for the house. I do a lot of fundraisers, sometimes just for other archives, but this has been a real labor of love. That kitchen crew, what it has done for us today in providing for that amount of money, both breakfast and lunch, really, it's fabulous. I've never seen a fundraiser like this anywhere in the country. And I happen to know the hard work, which we'll be talking about today, that went into it. So thank you, Florida. So now let's go back to the house in Akron. I'll tell you a little bit. There's how it looked in 1935. It's the earliest picture we have of the house to go by. And as we see Akron, that's howit would have looked when Bob and Bill were roaming the streets. not sure of what they had at the time and the house was purchased in 1915 that's why it's 100 years old right for four thousand dollars when we get the rockefeller money we get three thousand dollars which i'll tell you about later today uh so they must not put too much money down on it in 1916 and uh will enter the they'll both move in together his bride now here's ann she's standing by the window, and I love this picture because she had to wait 17 years for the marriage to take place. So she was a very patient woman, and Dr. Bob, you could say, was a little slow. It was a 17-year courtship. And I love this picture. It's actually, you'll see it in the new film that's out, but I've never seen a more beautiful picture of Ann than that, and some of them are so bad of her that I love being able to share this picture of the couple. Here's another picture of a couple and their dog roger uh pit bull of all things here's another picture i'm going to tell you a really quick story i have in the house there's a whoops i'm gonna go back one in the house there'S a cut out of ann there and i was up in the office one day and i heard somebody new down in the front room and they were saying well i didn't know the queen mom had anything to do with the alcoholic synonymous i cracked up so now i can't look at this picture without thinking of the queen. She's definitely the mother of AA. Another great picture of Bob. You can get kind of an idea of his stature as a younger man. We always see those older pictures of him. And if this isn't adorable, there is a young Dr. Bob with the most beautiful baby sitting on his lap. That's the Smith's biological son, Smitty. How many of you met Smitty? Smitty and Sue got around. So some of you had met the wonderful Smitty, but have you ever seen a baby picture? I mean, wait, I got a couple more to show you, and I just think they're precious. Now, at five years old, they adopted Sue, and they were both the same age, which really screwed up the school system. They couldn't figure out how Ann managed to produce that. But Sue was adopted, and they wrote a book called Children of the Healer. It's out of print now, but it's a really interesting book on their lives. And here they are later when I met them. And here they are at the time of the purchase of the home. This would be a current picture of them. And then one day we were at the house, and they were both there. And they wanted to pose. They asked me to take this picture of themselves. I took this picture because, you see, they didn't get along. So now we have a great picture. They got along later, but they fought the entire time they were living in the home." So that was... And here они были в кухне Доктора Боба дома. И я люблю эту фотографию тоже. If you read the early pamphlets coming out of Akron, they called the AA church the kitchen. And I still miss Kitchen Table AA when we used to put the coffee pot on the table. I see some heads nodding because this is old-time AA. Old-time AAA met at kitchen tables after the meeting where there was so much fellowship. You put the copy on, you sit around, and you hash out AA. And that's what Bob and Bill did in that kitchen. Here they are just sitting in the living room with the Bible. And then this one's for Ray. This one's für you, baby. this is when we were both young. I'm sitting, that's Sue here and Smitty, and you can see Ray there in the background, and there I am, and yeah, and that's John Leach. For any of you that knew John Leitch, he was a great, great man, and some of you may have known him too. All right, so this last picture is a picture taken of Ann Smith. This was taken a month before she died. She'll die in 1949. Dr. Bob will follow her in 1950. So it gives you kind of a feel for the couple that lived in 855 Ardmore. And so, and after Annie dies, you can see by this picture how forlorn Dr. Bobby was without her. They had a beautiful relationship. I love this one thing. Bob would come home and he'd look at Annie and say, how is our love today? I just think that's so sweet. So you can see here, this is kind of, and one of the reasons we know that is in some of the pictures you're going to see there was no carpeting. They get carpeting right to the end. And this is Dr. Bob. He'll give his last talk in Cleveland in 1950 where we accept the traditions and he will, we will leave us on November 16th of 1950. And if you stick around today, we're going play his last topic. It's a little very sweet. And when you come to Akron, of course, you can visit the Smith grave. Okay, next slide. Okay. So this is a slide that didn't quite transition, but after Bob dies, I think Sue's in charge of the estate and the house goes up for sale and then it becomes a rental. And then it comes up there in the left-hand corner, becomes a motorcycle place. It was the headquarter for a motorcycle gang. And in the right side, there's a drug scene there because it was a big drug house for a while. And in the early years of Founders Day, in fact, even when I came in, the buses would go by and the drunks on the porch would throw beer cans at the buses. So I'll just kind of offer this so you can appreciate. I'm giving you some more current history to appreciate what's happened in the last couple of years in Akron. And when you come, you'll have some ideas. So now the transitions want to work. Okay, there we go. A little fun there for you. okay so I think I pulled that story already um so here's our end of the scene this talk usually shows up in the talk I'm giving later today but I threw it in here because I come in in 1978 and the program is only 43 years old and I don't know what I've walked into but it was something very special my spirit knew that and I got to go to group number one and I to know the old timers. And so my history kind of starts there. And yes, there is a cigarette in one hand and there's a half a gallon in the other. And there's deck of cards there. Yeah, my zipper's down. Okay? Okay. We got that out of the way? All right. Now, I didn't know what I'd walked into, but I did fall in love with Alcoholics Anonymous. And they were no books out. Okay, AA comes of age. A little dry for me at the time. I'm in a bookstore and I run across this book. Now, this is 78. We don't have Pass It On. We don't Have Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers. This was written by Robert Thompson to the left of Bill here. That was Bill's biographer, and I still think it's a really great book. And I just resonated with our story. Now I'm in love with AA, but I fall in love avec the history, and find out that 855 Ardmore is in Akron. So I drive by the guy's house after reading the book, and give him my card, and said if you as much as remove a doorbell from this house or a doorknob, Just please call me. So that was my introduction to the owner at the time, which plays out later as all things do. So now I'm being asked. So the old timer said, do whatever you're asked to do in Alcoholics Anonymous. So they say, Gail, will you host Lois Wilson and her companions for Founders Day? We used to have it in JAR. I say yes. I don't know what a host is. I don' t know what I'm doing. But I end up seating Lois who had come in. Of course, Bob and Bill are gone, but Lois was still attending. and here in the back seat there in the blue that's Nell Wing. She comes in with knowing this and we're gonna talk a little bit about Nell because she's the reason why I stand here today. I meet as I'm seating Lois, I have to see her companions. I made this bubbly wonderful gal instantly we bond and I say to her now first of all she's Bill Wilson secretary let me see if the next slide Okay, here we go. She has come in as a receptionist. She ends up being a secretary. She ends up be a constant companion to Bill and Bill says he thought this thing might become myth so he asked her to keep the history. She later becomes our archivist. she was like a Wilson if you go to Stepping Stones there's a bedroom for her and she was a companion to Lois at the time so she starts talking to me and I'm so grateful to meet her I say to her no if there's ever anything I can do for you, just ask. Now those of you who are in Alcoholics Anonymous, I just want to tell you, watch what you say. She looks at me and she says, yes Gail, there is something I'd like you to do. I'd like you start an archives in Akron. So now I think God has spoken. I mean, I'm talking to Nell Wing and she's pretty up there, you know, and I think, okay God, all right. I don't know what an archives is. I can't do it. I'm not very sober. Remember I came in 78. This would be 84. So I want to tell you where Akron was at all the way up to about 20 years ago. If you had come to Akron, we had nothing. See that box on the right? That box on the left would have taken you back to this room, which used to be our office. If you had asked to come and see the archives, that's what you would have seen. For some reason, Akron didn't think keeping the history was important. It was about 12 Steppen. It's all about 12-step and we hadn't moved from that into where we're at today so the old timers and so your guy Wesley Parrish how many knew Wesley? Wesley Parrisch came to Akron he was a fabulous AA and he was speaking at Founders Day and he grabbed some of our old timERS that were in charge of Founders day and he started talking about what are you going to do about the house well I had already tried to buy the house from a guy who owned it by the name of OD how do you like that. But I didn't think that was a real good idea, because it would not be good for any one person to own Dr. Bob's house. Try staying sober for a week on that headiness. So Wesley comes in after I had done that, and he says, well, we'll start it. So next thing happens, I'm at an old-timer's funeral, one of my favorite old-timers in the world, and old- timer, who you're going to see here in a minute, and Ray's going to recognize her, the little redhead there. I'm going to go back for a second. Oh man, we are having, no it's not Ann Craw. It was, sorry about this, it was Kay Stewart and Kay Stewart asked me if I want to get involved in the purchase of Dr. Bob's home. Well that sure clicked with my former plan. So there she is, little redhead. Now, and I'm going to show you, and this is going to mean a lot to Ray, you haven't seen these people in a while either. These are some of the original people that were involved. Now she tells me in order to be a part of this i have to swear on a bible and give a hundred dollars and i'm not allowed to tell anybody this is top secret stuff and they i joined them and they at the second meeting and they say well we want you to negotiate to purchase on the house because you actually know the owner remember that little card i slipped him so now i'm going to make a cold call on a guy whose house is not for sale got that he's a student at the university he's got his little house here I ended up negotiating the contract on that house. That was the contract there for $38,000. It's a miracle. It's cold call. He signed it, held it in my name, and had to go an extra $500 for a grant that he had. Found that check later. And I got in trouble for that because I went up $500 more than we had agreed on that I was going to bid, which just seemed to me ridiculous. And I remember going to dinner that night with my mother before I went to do this thing. And I said to my mom, Mom, I'm on a secret mission for Alcoholics Anonymous. And it's of international importance, but I can't tell you what it is. She thought we were really nuts, I'll tell you. All right, so now we had 12 steps. We did not put those 12 steps in. I'm here to tell you there were 12 steps, and we had to walk around campus with badges on that says, Ask me about Dr. Bob's house because there was controversy about Bob. Look, I got some people here that walked this walk. We were not allowed to tell people in Akron that we had done this because they weren't in favor of this at all. This was highly controversial. I still have my button. So now I take off and I go to New York and I call Nell up. I says, okay, we have the house. I'm ready to put the archives in the house and so she teaches me while there the difference between stepping stones and our general service office. what Bill's work for us in the general service office is in general service office his private work and his family stuff is at stepping stones there's a difference between service structure and a foundation you try telling that to those old-timers in Akron so here I am having a drink with Lois and yes that is me in the picture I like to say I'm sober in that picture but my hair hadn't sobered up yet it's still kind of powerless over it and now it looks like the my zippers down on my skirt there I'm not sure so I spend the next couple days now takes me into her home yeah I'm saying with no and I start whining because I want to put the archives in dr. Bob's house and she says well it's okay Gail but you'd be a foundation archivist I won't be a Foundation Archivist all I know is Alcoholics Anonymous all I know is the principles of Alcoholics anonymous and I got very confused so I So I ended up leaving the house and trying to set the archives up under structure. And along with Nell's help, there's another picture of Nell and I together, much younger. So I wandered for ten years trying to get AA in Akron to care about its history. After ten years they give me this room that I showed you before. So we're talking about 1995, 1994 and along with another friend who's now the archivist there. If you visit our office I'm just going to quickly show you to make sure you get to both places you will see the archives there. This is a miracle because we didn't have any money, just a lot of hard work in bulletin boards because I'm a retired school teacher. And if you've not been to Akron be sure to stop in our office and take advantage of the history that we tell you there. We're not a historical site, but there's lots of history there. So now I'm going to go back to the house. The house is moving forward. They got the rock. Remember when we were there with the rock? Okay. And here's out of the newspaper. Yeah, you have Sue and her husband Ray out of a newspaper. We are 50 years old now. We are opening up the house . You're looking at John Seiberling here. That's Henrietta Seiberlings' son who was there at the Gate Lodge when it all came down. And he became a congressman, so he became a big help in opening up the house and putting it on the national register. Big friend of A.A.'s. There's the governor and Sue opening the house. Another nice picture of Sue. Now the house is open, but listen to what it says in one of our newsletters. The home of Dr. Bob and Ann, this is 1988, is yours now. They've got it. You have worked hard to make it so. I've heard that God will do the impossible if we do the possible. God will do the impossible if we do the possible. Come home to Dr. Bob's house and visit often. What's a home without a family? And you are the family, and the money that you've donated today will go back to keep the family home and the history of the family home. And I'll tell you a little more where we're going with that because we're gonna need you. And we lost Sandy too, and he was wonderful about helping us. Alright, 1998 In 1989, do you remember this one, Ray? The restoration where they tore the house apart. We'll be some moaning from this table, I'm sure. We're moving forward to where it started. So that first renovation project and here's some renovation pictures. And now every year in November we have something we call Gratitude Sunday and here are some of our finest old-timers. God bless them. Every year we do a nice event. We can't put it in the house anymore but we used to have it in our house. we've moved it out and hundreds come come on remote there we go 1993 more restoration and in 1994 we buy the house next door and here we have Dick A who helped us with the film called A House of Miracles and some of you may have seen that movie The House Does That and then we go back to now I come back to the house about 8 years ago I left my work at the office I'm back at the house just in time to help with this restoration now this says viewer discretion advised the following content may be disturbing to members of our society and members are encouraged to say the serenity prayer before viewing our stomachs were in knots when this happened this was a hundred thousand dollar renovation uh we tapped into almost everything we had because darn it I don't like this jumping around we're doing here all right so that's Harmon Harmon is now the chairman and this is the kitchen before we did it and here we have the guys that worked on the house and can you imagine walking into the house and seeing that the ceilings were bowing remember it's a hundred years old the floors were weak everything was cracked behind the wallpaper and so we had to take down all of that this just made us crazy to look at this what the beams in in the, see that beam? We had to put in real strong beams into the basement. That was huge. We had a little wiring problem. Can you imagine if the house had burned down? This is why we need funding. See when I was in New York, see Lois actually dies almost in the house. Everything in the House with funding from royalties and everything. Stepping Stones had it all in place. In Akron, Smiths are only alive for 15 years and then this house goes into all this disrepair. Oh, I'm sorry, I just put my hand in your head. All this disrepairs. We had to start with no money, no royalties, no furniture. It was a different deal than the other place, especially stepping stones. We've made a lot of mistakes, but we've learned a lot of great lessons. Even that linoleum, I don't know if we'll ever get a craftsman that will ever be able to replace that linoлеum again. We moved the bathtub built steps and moved the rock and the thing. And then along came, just recently, Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, Ken Salazar, recognizing the home as a place that possesses exceptional value and quality in illustrating or interpreting the heritage of the United States, designated Dr. Bob's home as a National Historic Landmark. And we cut the ribbon on that Mother's Day weekend. And that was pretty much a landmark for us. Stepping Stones also got it at the same time. All right, so we don't have the coffee pot because it's up at Brown University. But this picture that I'm taking of the house is of 1935, how it would have looked when Bob and Bill met there. That is a picture taken out of the memorial issue of the grapevine, but that's how it looked. Notice there's no painting or anything. Now, shortly after that, you see they painted everything white and there's carpeting, so that must be much later because they didn't get carpeting until right to the end. And if you visit the home, there's a piece of that carpeting we have now in between two chairs that I'll show you here in a minute. Another picture of the Smiths. I got some real cute stuff here coming up with the kids. There's a nice picture of Dr. Bob. And another one taken in the back of the house as it would have looked there. And, of course, we know that some of that's not the way it was today. So we try to make it look like Dr. Bob and Ann just stepped out and went to a meeting. I even hide the Kleenex boxes sometimes just because I want you when you come in to take a deep breath and to just kind of sense what it was like back in the late 30s or 40s and not get into the modern technology at all. So Dr. Bob said there are certain things that he loved to do that we've tried to represent in the house, and one of them was cards, and the other one was cars. And here you see him playing cards. He said if you can't have fun in sobriety, you're not doing it right. And he was such an outdoors guy. So as you see this, you're going to see we have his golf club and we don't have his fishing rod, But we've kind of simulated some things to remind you of the kind of man that Bob was in that day and age. And here he is. This is funny. This is a Smitty story, but this is Smitty's car, and they've gone to Yellowstone. And there's Dr. Bob standing outside of it, and you probably have never seen that picture. But Smitty looks at Dr. Robb because they didn't have a top for that car. And Smitty says to Bob, what are we going to do if it rains? And Bob looks at him. This is the typical Bob thing. Dr. Robert looks at Smitty, and he says, we're going to get wet. Here they are racing down here in Florida at Daytona. Yeah, Smitty, yeah. See, we've got some Florida history in this because they used to come down here, and isn't that cool? You can tell how much both men loved cars. And what I want to show you next, and there he is. Oh, this is great. You see, he's up in age now. This is his last car. And they said that the older he got, the faster he drove them. and he would rev this car up come flying down Ardmore slam on the brakes and skid into the curb so see when you get some of this story when you come to the house if you visit again you're going to have a little background to some of us and I just love that story what a character what a character so now the renovation is complete and this is what the house looks like today and and I'm really proud of it I just think it just turned out beautiful thank you So I want you to know I paid to the patron saint of decorating and preservation. So Annie was sitting on her Victrola because they didn't have modern technology then, which is really interesting when kids come through when they see some of the items back in the 30s, and she'd listen to opera and conventions, political stuff. Now what's really cool now, if you haven't been there recently, if you look to the left, that's a new chair. that's Dr. Bob you'll see pictures of Dr. Bob in that chair also to the right with the lamp there he rewired that gas lamp that's Annie's Bible sitting on the table Dr. Bob's is behind it and all the books behind there are original books of Dr., Bob now remember we started with nothing everything and I know Ray can testify for this we've come I hope you can see we've done a lot we've gone a long way I really want you to know how hard we work as a board as a member of the board we don't pay an operations manager. We don't have one, like Stepping Stones and other places as a foundation would usually hire somebody. We all do it as a board. We're working really hard. And I really think we've turned a corner here. So the house is absolutely gorgeous. You'll see a lot of books. Bob couldn't sleep at night, so he had insomnia, so he read all the time. He was such a ferocious reader. We've got books on the floor. And there's your dining room table. What's his name? Al, are you here today? Hey, Al. Al, would you just stand for a second? Ray, just real quick, tell them. Al is the gentleman that made all the cabinets up, cut the lumber and plywood. In the archives house. Also, the sliding glass door came from Cleveland, Ohio, though, through the chairman of the board. Well, again, thanks to Florida. See, you guys, you don't know. I mean, the ambassadors are coming up. Hopefully after today more of you will come and realize that it is your home too. So thank you, Al. And as you can tell, Ray and I, I'm standing here in front of Ray. And Ray, while I was over putting up the archives at our office, Ray was taken over at the house. So you can see we have this memory. We're walking down memory lane today, aren't we? Well, we are. All right, so now you're looking at the table, which we just recently got. Right before Sue died, she sold us some things. One of them, this is the original table that the big book I'm going to talk about later today. Three-fifths of the stories came from Akron. They were written around this table here. And there's a deck of cards on that table, of course. And I just took a little film with my camera here so you can kind of get a little dimension. In the typewriter, Sue was studying typing and so she was typing the stories up. They didn't even want to write those stories. And she actually married the fourth man in and his story was in the book, Ernie G. So we put Ernie's story in the type writer. And there is Annie's little spot there in the house. She took up smoking so we have a Goodyear ashtray there and a directory, but she would sit there all day long. The mother of AA would call out and actually sponsor people and check their guidance on the phone. And then we can go into the new kitchen. Can you see the difference now in the kitchen? That's the original color of the cabinets. Come on. Well, I think we missed the kitchen. Oh, we can't miss the kitchen。 Well, let's see. Maybe we can look back. I have to tell you about the potatoes. That's a cracky up, but I have talked about it. These are the guys that wrote the stories in the book. Okay, there we go. We're back in the kitchen, and we're going in the kitchen now, and the reason why I'm so excited about the potatoes is I never want to forget to tell you that our story takes place in a depression. They did not have enough food. They are taking people into the house. All they have is potatoes. So I'm big on trying to tell the story as how it occurred, and somebody lovingly sent me the most beautiful potatoes in the mail recently. And so now the guides and the tourists can talk to you about potatoes and potato soup, potato salad, potato pancakes, potato everything, and realize that our co-founders told us we would not have been successful without that depression because it brought us together. With what little they had, they helped each other, and that's fellowship. And it was great back then. So please, when you see those potatoes, thank whoever sent those potatoes. But the kitchen looks great. There they are again. You see, I'm very happy about those potatoes. Yeah, don't they look real though? Oh my God. I've been looking at museums forever trying to do that. Okay, so we really like those potatoes Okay, we're upstairs now. This is Smitty's bedroom. Only Smitty during this time was not often in his bedroom. When he'd come home, he'd smell the peraldehyde. He'd go up into the attic, which I'm going to show you is now open. but this would be where Bob and Bill would sleep and they would, this would be where bob comes back and he says bill I'm going through with it and the whole story takes place in there. But also this is the detox room and what you'll see here is that the jars of peraldehyde and sauerkraut and tomatoes. Smitty would tell you was a pretty hearty bunch to eat all that. This is Ann Smith's bedroom I'm gonna tell you real quick if I've got the time about this that is the original furniture, her dress. I'm going to ask you to read Dr. Bob McGirtle's timers and look for the dress story and you'll understand why that dress is on there. But that is really the footboard because this is the furniture that Sue Smith sold to us. And apparently Ernie was smoking one night and burned up the headboard. So we had to take that and make the foot board made into the head board. So that's a cute little story. There's so many good stories. I can't tell you all of them. you know the story about Bob hiding the bottles there in the clothes chute well we took the medicine cabinet and we tried to make it with some of the items that would have been in there but I'm looking for bromo seltzer so if anybody finds bromo I'm pretty sure Bob took a lot of bromo is that up there oh okay great great thank you good eye good eye now here I'm really excited how many have never been back since we've done the attic okay let me tell you about the attic. We hadn't done anything until last year. We ripped up the carpeting, and what happened is we were able to get Dr. Bob's baby crib. This is what his mother Susie put him in as a young child. More importantly, next to it is a christening gown. We think it could have been Dr. Bobs. We definitely know it's Smitty's because if you go there today, it's not going to show in this picture, but there'll be a picture I'll show you in just a minute, canvas of Aunt Smith holding up the baby. And just to give you an example of why we need funding, it costs us, we sent the christening gown out professionally because obviously it's a precious, precious thing. It cost us $1,500 to have that done. And so doing this kind of work, preservation work isn't cheap. You know who you're looking at now? No, you're not. Dr. Bob. We never saw this before. This just came in recently. It's all grace. I'm telling you, it's all Grace. So that's in a frame over the crib, and look at that baby. And there's the christening gown. And if you look here, look at the baby. Now to me, that is the cutest baby God ever made. That is Smitty. Every picture of Smitty just melts my heart. Okay, so we're making it into the Vermont room. What you're looking at here is what I believe to be Dr. Bob's father's mother's sampler yeah that is a while on its own from that period of time it's a while it's worth a lot that just anybody but us it's priceless another fifteen hundred to get that it was going to be deteriorating the acid from the cardboard it was on would have eaten it up because we have to deal with all kinds of uv stuff and things like that at this point so that you'll see now it's up under plexi and we hope it's conserved enough If you're looking at Dr. Bob's father, as you read Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers, this is the man that stood by Dr. Bob. This is the men who fetched him and cared for him, and unfortunately, the saddest part is never live to see Bob gets over. The mother was another story. We have the father's Bible now. It will all be in the Vermont room, and we're going to try to tell you a little bit, hopefully someday, using Smitty's voice to tell you about St. Johnsbury, Dr. Bob's home, and of course, Vermont was Bill's as well. So we're trying to give you a little background of that in this room. Oh, stop it. I want to show you the maids' quarters where Smitty went. There's the mails' quarters. That's new. Smitty would go up here, and I believe that was Ann's sewing machine room. You know, depression is going on. Ann Smith sewed for all the people. If she saw that it was winter, she would sew a collar on your sweater. And if it was spring, she Would take that collar off. Remember, they were all helping each other. So important thing Ann was doing was caring for the families, always caring for the people. So we have an old sewing machine up there now in that room. It's got some stuff from Smitty, his World War II stuff. He was quite a pilot and this thing is flipping a lot but we're in the basement now and this is what you can take some great photo ops down there. We've blown the pictures up. We don't have the car but we certainly have a feeling of the basement as it might have been, with the cars. There's Smitty. Look at that as a young kid. And there's Ann's little area there where she cared for the clothing and stuff, or Sue. I guess Sue really had to do a lot of it, sometimes the maid. And then here we have the cellar. I don't have the coal bin there. And when you go to the other house, there's going to be a lot of new things at the house next door. This was recently donated, a book that Dr. Bob signed and it's got his letterhead and stuff in it and his medicine stuff and one of the things in the next picture you're going to see that you see is my friend Boxer and he's looking at a book on the third shelf. I don't have it labeled very well yet but I want you to know that that came to us It is a 1939 Webster's Dictionary from his office and right underneath it is an hourglass that he used. It's even a little bit worn. It's a long story how this all happened and we never saw it coming and it's there now so that room has got a lot of artifacts in it now that it never had. As you know Dr. Bob was a proctologist that's why he was so good with us, don't you think? Okay now my remote doesn't seem to want to get there we go and i just thought kind of in closing how many of you meant a founder's day it's a great party but it's you're gonna have to wait if you come another time you won't have to stand in those long lines please know that we understand our responsibility better today than before perhaps of the responsibility that we in akron carry for you. And I just, on behalf of the board of Dr. Bob's House, want to thank Florida. I am totally thinking this is an awesome day that you showed up, that the help has provided, the services that they provided for you today. I'm taking this back to the board and they're going to know what a great day we had here today in Florida. I know I'm their representative today to thank you. Thank you for all that you've done and I know that you'll continue continue to do for the House. Thank you.