Bill Put His Arm Around Ebby at the Subway and Said I Don’t Know What You Got Kid but I Want to Get It – Ebby T.
About This Speaker Tape
Ebby T., introduced as the man who first carried the message of recovery to Bill Wilson, shares his remarkable firsthand account of the events that led to the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous. Speaking in Memphis in 1958, Ebby describes growing up in Auburn, New York, starting to drink while in school, getting expelled, and working in his father's iron foundry. He traces his progressive alcoholism through the collapse of the family business in 1922, the deaths of both parents, and years of increasing trouble with the law.
The pivotal summer of 1934 arrives when Ebby, facing a third arrest for drunkenness in Vermont — which meant six months in Windsor State Prison — is visited by two old drinking companions, Steve McGraves and Chet Cornell, who had found help through the Oxford Group. They ask him a simple question that changes everything: had he ever thought of letting Higher Power run his life? Roland Hazard intervenes with the judge, and Ebby is released. He describes a small but powerful moment of victory — carrying six bottles of ale from his cellar to his neighbor rather than drinking them before his court date — and the weight that lifted from his shoulders.
Ebby then recounts the historic evening he visited Bill Wilson at 182 Clinton Street in Brooklyn. Bill was drinking but listened as Ebby talked until one o'clock in the morning. Walking Ebby to the subway afterward, Bill put his arm around him and said, "I don't know what you got, kid, but you got something, and I want to get it." Days later, Bill showed up drunk at Calvary Mission where Ebby was living, and shortly after entered Towns Hospital. Ebby emphasizes his belief that once you start carrying the message to someone, you must stick with them through tough spots and victories alike.
With characteristic honesty, Ebby acknowledges his own struggles — slipping after two years and seven months, cycling through periods of sobriety and relapse over the years, and ultimately finding stability in Dallas, Texas, where AA members took him in. He closes with a passionate appeal to stay active in AA and never forget where sobriety came from, warning that retiring to the country club and abandoning meetings is like stopping your medicine.
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Full Transcript
I'm going to introduce, you could stand here for a long, long time.
I've been fortunate in knowing Eddie for 17 years.
That's the length of time I know Bill, too.
I met Eddie 17 years ago.
Bill met him almost 24 years ago.
Bill, take,...
I've been fortunate in knowing Eddie for 17 years.
That's the length of time I know Bill, too.
I met Eddie 17 years ago.
Bill met him almost 24 years ago.
Bill, take,...
I'm going to introduce, you could stand here for a long, long time.
I've been fortunate in knowing Eddie for 17 years.
That's the length of time I know Bill, too.
I met Eddie 17 years ago.
Bill met him almost 24 years ago.
Bill, take, call it what you will, grace of God, but wait not for the man that you're
about to hear.
You wouldn't be having this meeting tonight because he's the first guy that brought the
message to our boy Bill.
If you've read the book Alcoholics Anonymous, and I know that most of you have, in there
you'll hear in Bill's story, always referring to my friend.
And then in the later book, describing Alcoholics Anonymous and other stories that just came
out some short time ago, the name Ebby comes out.
But always in the first book, you'll hear him referred to as my friend.
Should you hear a lot of us at different times and in different parts of the country,
according to how Bill came in, how the organization or the fellowship started, there's only
one man in the world tonight who knows exactly how it started, because he was sober and Bill
was drunk.
So, I give you my friend and your friend, our founder.
Ebby.
Thank you, Dick.
I was a big soldier.
My name is Ebby, and I'm an alcoholic.
I don't know if this is how to start this off.
Dick asked me over here.
I was very glad to come.
It's an honor.
You're not coming to Memphis, people.
Well, I had an idea.
I was one of two or three speakers, and I didn't know I was going to hold this thing
down for 40 or 45 minutes.
Back home in Dallas, I'm known as the world's shortest speaker.
They used me back there on the different clothes for the 10-minute and 15-minute spots.
So, I don't know if that's how I'm going to go about holding down for 45 minutes, but
I do the best I can.
In fact, I've been living in Texas for five years now.
Maybe I've got a job.
Maybe I've got a job.
Maybe I've got a job.
I've gotten enough of that Texas braggadocio somewhere in my system.
Maybe I was so affluent that I can pull some of that out of the hack.
There's a story I heard a year or two after I got in Dallas.
It's called the take-away hacking.
I hope you'll indulge me and let me tell it.
There was a Texas rancher who drove over to his nearest neighbor.
It was about 15 miles.
He said, what do you say we go to town and make a day?
Yeah, but that's all right.
Got his hat and he got in the car and he started out.
As soon as he got out of the side of the ranch house, he opened up and searched the boardroom.
Had a good long pull on the bottle and the first guy said, you know,
there was a ship 2,000 bulls from Fort Worth the day before yesterday.
Nothing was said.
They drove on a while and came to a gate and they had to open that.
They had another pull at the bottle and the second guy said, you know,
I shipped 2,500 bulls.
From my side, I mean, four or five days ago.
And they drove along just before they got to the main state highway.
They stopped for a third good hooker.
The first rancher said again, you know, I think we're the two biggest bull shippers in Texas.
And I hope I've acquired a little of that so I can spread it out tonight.
I know that Drake and...
Jim Drake and some of the other boys
wanted me to tell you some of the beginnings of
AA as I experienced them.
And you know, I think that
I appreciate the things that Dick has said and other people have said about me.
But I sometimes think it might be
claim to fame as an exhibit A in the antique division of alcoholics in Baltimore.
That's about it.
Well, I got to go.
And back to some of my beginnings.
I started drinking when I was in school.
I come from Auburn in New York.
It's my native town.
Went to a private school there.
I started drinking last year.
I seemed to hold it under control pretty well.
I did get off on a wild party one night.
It was a military school.
We had a competitive drill.
After the drill, I went out and met with some of us.
Went out and got drunk.
And we got in a mess.
And the principal of the school heard about it.
But nothing was said.
But I, uh...
I wasn't very well that spring.
And they took me out of school before.
School was over.
And that summer, the principal wrote to his father.
And he always called me Ed.
He didn't call me Ebby or Eb.
He said, I don't think we can do anything more for Ed.
It's not that he was just telling me from school.
So that fall, my father said,
you're going to work in the foundry.
My father happened to be in the iron foundry business.
So I went to work that fall.
And, uh, I confined my drinking to Saturday night.
Naturally, I had to get up at six o'clock to go down.
I worked as a motorist helper.
Which is fairly rugged work, as you may know.
And I did that for a year.
And I confined most of my drinking to Saturday.
Except around Christmas time when all the dances were going on.
Then I really stepped out.
And I remember I tried to go to work.
Drinking and dancing and getting down to work at seven o'clock in the morning.
But I was young.
And you shake it off and work it off by night.
And I managed to get away with it for a while.
But as I look back and remember those times,
I wasn't a very successful drinker from the start.
There were times...
There were times, too, when I'd take some of the older guys around all of me home.
And other times, I'd be climbing the chandelier.
I'd have three or four drinks.
I never knew what was going to happen.
In fact, the matter is, when I was about 15 years old,
I remember putting a lot of thought into this business of drinking
because it was in my family.
My brothers drank pretty heavily.
My father did.
And, uh...
I kind of figured that...
They drank that way.
And it wasn't any good for them.
And it was no good for me, either,
because I was just about the same compromise as they were.
But it was that first drink that I ever took on my own
when I walked into the bar of the hotel tonight in Auburn
and ordered a glass of beer all by myself.
And I was a big shot.
And I still say that was the best glass of beer I ever tasted.
Sometimes I can almost taste it again.
And somehow, that...
That just gave me just the same...
The same glow.
And, uh...
That beer was a lot stronger in those days.
And it was real beer.
That was about 1914, I think.
19...
Yes, it was 1914.
And I know that I said to myself,
this is for me.
And soon after that, when I started drinking,
I kept it down pretty well at two or three drinks.
I used to grab...
Uh...
Of an evening that spring,
uh...
Um, this friend of mine, I went to school.
He called me up and asked me if I had my lessons done.
I said, sure.
I guess it was just a fall
because the family was sitting in the room.
And I said, sure, Andy.
I'll go out and have a chug of milk with you.
I got time.
And we were far from chugging milk.
But I managed to get home by 11 o'clock,
so there was nobody knowing about it.
But I know that the effect and the taste of alcohol
was fascinating to me from the beginning.
And later on, I read
a book called
The Common Sense of Drinking
from which a lot of AA was taken
by Dick Peabody.
He's not dead,
but he was one of the first of the
lay therapists that
had a tremendous following of alcoholics.
A lot of other books have been written
by a lot of his pupils.
The Glass Crutch is one of them
by Dutch Chambers, and I can name a half of those.
I can't think of them right now.
But he said in that book,
that the difference between an alcoholic
and a heavy drinker was
that the heavy drinker
might drink just as much
on a given night as the alcoholic,
but the next day was another day to him,
and he went to work,
and his first thing in the...
awakening in the morning was the office.
Well, the first step that the alcoholic had
was on the night before,
and where could he get the next drink
to bring that party back again?
And that always appealed to me
because that's the way I was.
I'd forget business
and want to get somewhere
where I could get with the gang again.
And he said the effect of alcohol
on people of your type
is too fast and urgent.
You can't handle it.
But I knew that...
But I knew then
that a couple of days
worth of drinking in my family,
I figured out
that I better lay...
sit and stay away from it,
but I never did
once I had that drink.
And as time went on,
I, of course,
got into a lot more trouble.
And the family business broke up
as one of those things do.
It's been running since 1852,
and it broke up in 1922.
And I was more or less on the loose
and...
Yeah.
From one job to another.
And getting in more trouble all the time.
And the drinking was increasing.
I didn't get overseas in World War I,
but I was in the outfit
that was stationed around
right in my hometown of Albany.
And in the state armory there,
I got to be a second lieutenant
in this outfit,
and we always had a jug
in the officer's quarters
because it was a drugget
in one of the corners
right near the armory.
And I always...
And somehow,
I managed to get a barrel of whiskey,
and we could get it there
because those were the days of prescription.
The doctor would issue you a prescription
during probation,
and you'd go in and get this
pint of whiskey,
but we got it all we wanted.
We got that gallon jug filled
repeatedly.
And I was a pretty two-fisted drinking crowd,
and they were all older than I was.
And finally,
we got into a jam one night.
We got in a taxi wreck,
and I just got superficial cuts,
and I just got superficial cuts,
in my both wrist and in my face.
But I was kind of a bloody mess.
I was just bleeding a lot,
and my father came in.
I was sitting on the bed,
and he said,
you get out of that
National Guard tomorrow morning,
and you leave my house.
Well, I didn't feel like
leaving this house last night,
so late that afternoon,
I walked up and told the captain
I was going to resign,
requested to be put on the reserve.
So that ended my National Guard career,
and that's the phase of the drinking.
Well, things got worse,
and my father and mother died in 27,
my father in 29.
And I was sticking around then pretty bad.
I inherited some money from my father.
I should have had sense enough
to take care of it,
but I didn't.
I lost half of it overnight
in the stock market trash,
and the rest I just found to drain
over a period of a year,
a year and a half.
And we used to summer in Vermont,
and it was there that I met Bill Wilson,
but it was longer ago
than 24 years ago.
I first knew Bill about 1910.
I went to school with him in 1912,
which has taken us back
quite a few years.
And as we get back,
we went to Summers
and the mansion in Vermont.
Well, after my father died,
the house was vacant up there,
and we bought a house
after all the years
that father had spent money
at the hotel for all of us.
He bought a house in 1923,
and in 1929 he died,
and the house was empty.
All my other brothers were married.
Father died without a will,
so they just divided up the furniture
and had to come for me,
and I had one room furnished in that house,
and the rest was bare.
And I was living there all alone,
drinking heavily all the time.
Got ready,
and then we jumped out,
and now we're going to get up
to the summer of 1934.
This was 24 years ago.
And I'd been on the toils of the law
twice that summer.
I'd gotten drunk,
gotten arrested for being drunk and disorderly,
fined $5 or something like that.
And it seems that in Vermont at that time,
I don't know whether the law
is still on the statute books or not,
but if you got arrested three times
at any one given year for drunkenness,
it meant six months in Windsor State Prison.
Well, I was getting drunk right along.
One time I got drunk,
and I still don't know exactly how it happened,
but I was in my own house,
and finally somebody got out a wire for me.
I still don't see yet what I was doing.
I thought I was on my own property.
But one of the boys,
a boy that was constable at the time,
was a guy that I'd gone to school with in 1912,
and he said,
I went to school the same year
that I went to school with Bill Wilson.
I forgot to say that I went to a private school in Albany,
but this one year I went up there in Vermont
in 1912,
in the fall of 1912,
to go to that school
from one year and then back to my other.
And this other boy was John Jackson.
He was constable.
And I walked uptown the next day.
Well, I went up and sat on the store,
the steps of the hardware store
that's out to the owner of it.
My son John drove up and said,
sorry, he says,
everybody got a warrant for you.
Got to take you down to Bennington,
which is a county city.
He took me down and saw the judge.
And the judge says,
be back Monday.
He said, well,
let's see what we can do about you.
Well, I've gotten ahead of my story
because before that,
I'd say late in July
or the first part of August,
two men came to see me,
two fellas that I had drunk with often.
And one of them happened to be
the son of this judge.
His name is Steve McGraves
and he's now living in Paris, France.
And the other one is Chet Cornell
and I don't know just where he is.
I think he's somewhere in Ohio.
And I had a hangover, of course,
and these two guys wanted around.
I was out and back somewhere
in the kitchen, I guess.
I remember they came up the back steps.
And they started,
they didn't know exactly how to begin on me
because they remembered me
and I had a lot of fun with me drinking.
And I saw they had something on their mind,
so I said, well,
what do you got on your mind?
What's cooking?
And they said, well,
we kind of come and see you
and said we couldn't
get some idea into your head
about something.
I said, you mean about my drinking?
And they said, yeah,
you're not getting anywhere.
I understand you're in wrong all over town.
And we just sort of,
well, we just sort of,
we got mixed up with a group
called the Oxford Group.
And we thought that you could get help
if you joined up with us.
And they said,
you ever think of letting God run your life
instead of every pastor trying to run it all the time?
And they really talked sense
the way I figured it,
and it seemed to me
that they were just telling me things
that I hadn't.
I'd been taught in my childhood
about the right way of living.
And I said, well,
gee, if these two guys
have got something out of this,
maybe there's hope for me
because I've just about given up hope.
And I said, I was willing to quit drinking
but I didn't know how.
Excuse me.
I didn't know how to do it.
So I listened to them
and they left me a book
by one of these men in the Oxford Group.
I don't recall the name of that book now.
But in it,
I could see myself staring out of those pages.
Now, the Oxford Group, let me explain,
was not concentrated on alcohol.
Alcoholism.
It was a spiritual group
that was founded by
a minister from Pennsylvania
named Frank Bookman,
B-U-C-H-M-A-N.
It got its name Oxford Group
because it was a group
because Bookman got a lot of people interested
and they in turn went abroad
and they went to England
and Oxford University
and they got a lot of people interested over there.
And from there,
they went to South Africa.
And they got quite a big meeting down there.
I don't know if it was Cape Town
or one of those cities.
And the reporters referred to them
as the group from Oxford
and that damn name stuck
and it had no more to do
with the group or its foundings
than anything in the world.
But just like those things happen,
that's the name it stuck in.
And it was called the Oxford Group.
And they were really
trying to find something.
It was that time in 1929
when the crash had come on Wall Street
and the nation was kind of a low point economically.
A lot of people were hopping out of windows in New York
and that's no joke because they were.
A lot of them hit those manholes
head-on from the 30th floor.
And a lot of people were drinking terribly
and they wanted to find something
in this Oxford Group.
A lot of people came around to it
and of course a good many of them
happened to be alcoholics.
And don't ever let yourself think
that nobody but an alcoholic
can help an alcoholic
because there were a lot of men
in this group who were very understanding
and had a damn good knowledge
of the thinkings of an alcoholic's mind.
And I sometimes think
that our minds are no different
than anybody else in this world.
We just give in to things
that other people do not.
Well, anyway, that idea appealed to me.
I read the book
and I filled it up for a few days
and I started to paint the house
but I had a ladder that was too short
and I couldn't get up to all these places.
And I made a deal with a boss painter
and he sent around one of his men
with some equipment
and the two of us finished the house.
I didn't touch the drop all that time
but the minute that job was over
sure I went right back to the bottle
because I had nothing more to interest me.
It was a letdown.
And it was then
I met Minge after the
thing in the house that I was picked up
and taken to this county judge.
There's one thing that sticks in my mind
and it always will.
I knew it would at that time.
It may not mean anything to you.
You may not get what I mean by it
but as we drove home,
I knew it would.
As we drove home that afternoon
this constable, John Jackson,
left me off at the house that I was living in
and he said,
well, I'll be around to get you Monday.
This was Friday.
And he said,
remember the judge says be sober.
I said, yep, I'll be sober.
So I went in the house
and I remembered that down cellar
I had about a half a dozen bottles of ale
and I know that they're going to be nice and cool.
And the one thing I like in this world
is Valentine's Ale.
And that was it.
So I went down cellar
and I said to myself,
I can't possibly get drunk
between now and Monday
on six bottles of ale.
And I know that nobody in town
is going to sell me anymore
if they've heard that I...
You know what a small Vermont community is.
Everybody from ten miles up and down the valley
knows all about anything like that.
And I knew another...
I mean, the bootlegger wouldn't tell me anything.
And I got down
and I reached one of those bottles
and uh-uh.
That ain't crooked.
All right, the judge said
you'd get there sober,
but you'd be there sober.
No, that isn't.
That's cheating.
That's somehow...
And I walked back upstairs
and that damn devil's
up on my shoulder.
Get off.
Go on down there and take it.
I couldn't take that damn ale.
That's just not...
That's not...
That's not the spirit of the thing.
It might be...
Technically, I might be all right.
I'd get there sober
expecting it,
but that's not exactly what he meant.
He didn't say don't take a drink,
but that's exactly what he meant.
So I took them
and put them in a basket
and carried them over
to my next-door neighbor
and I said,
here, they're yours.
And that minute,
I had a victory.
I know that.
I had something
that was just like a weight
being lifted from my shoulders.
And I've often thought about it
in later years
when I started drinking again
why I couldn't
recapture that feeling
that I had then.
And I said,
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
So that's that.
That's the
drink cloud.
And later on,
you
can get a more
mature,
if I may use the word,
outlook.
But I don't think
if you have a slip,
you can ever
go back again.
Well,
as it turned out,
I went down there Monday
and there had been
a third man
come to see me, too.
His name was
Roland Hazard.
And he was a pretty
swell gent, too.
I never knew him.
I never met him before.
These other two guys
I had.
And he was there
on Monday
when I was brought
for the judge.
The judge started
to give me
a little luck here
and he said,
Hazard,
will you
take this man
and lease this door?
So I was released
and my own
recognizance
and
the charges
were dropped.
And this guy
put me in.
He took me back home
and left me there.
And a few days later
I closed the house up
and went down
and stayed with him.
He lived about
15 miles below
south of the town.
And then we went
on down to New York.
And I stayed
with Chuck Cornell
and one of his other
chaps
that had come to see me.
I stayed there
about a month,
I guess.
And during that time
we made trips
back to Vermont
Hazard and I
and
two weeks after
I was there,
I was connected
with a factor group
by which
there's a much
looser membership
than Alcoholics Anonymous.
I really think.
I went,
they got me out
speaking.
The first weekend
that I went out
speaking,
we went up
through Vermont.
I spoke in a junior
college,
two churches,
a town meeting hall,
and someplace else
all in two nights.
Two afternoons
and two nights.
And I still
don't know
what I talked about.
But I just
felt good
about the whole thing
and
really figured
that these guys
must have something.
That there must be
a higher power
because they were
the ones
that originally
say
believe in
a higher God
or a higher power
as you understand it.
And
as well,
I was doing this
and going back
to New York
and
I heard about Bill.
I hadn't seen Bill
I don't believe
for over a year
although Bill
you see
was born and raised
in a town
six miles north
of this town
of Manchester, Vermont
where I used to
summer.
Also spent quite a few
winters there.
And I heard
that Bill
was in pretty tough shape
drinking bad
and I
had been downtown
in Wall Street
and seen some
of my old friends
one of whom
I had built
a sister-in-law
and he said
he was in tough shape
and he said
why don't you
give him a ring
or a telephone?
And I said
well I will
but I want to
think this thing out
a little
and get myself
a pretty good store
and a pretty good
pick to get for him.
And I can
truthfully say now
that I believe
that if I
went over there
Bill would either
go for it
lock, stock and barrel
or he would have
none of it.
He wouldn't just
play around with it
for a little while
I thought that
if he put his teeth
under it once
he'd stick to it.
But I
thought
I knew him
pretty well
I've been going
to school with him
and seen him
over the years
so I called him
up one night
and I didn't get
to Bill
but I got lost
his wife
and
told her
what had happened
to me
that this
must have
kind of
shown me
something
well I don't
even sober myself
in about
five possibly
six or seven weeks
but I think
sometimes
the initial
effect
that we get
from a thing
is we're more
powerful than
we are later on
we get stale
well anyway
Lois said
let's go over
to dinner
that night
and
since he's
much in debate
I said fine
so that night
I went over
that
half past five
I guess
in the evening
and
I rang
the bell
at 182
Clinton Street
the only
person home
was an old
colored man
named Green
who I've known
for years
he'd been with
the family
and Lois'
family
and others
and he said
they're both out
both Mrs. Wilson
and Mr. Wilson
and I
would come on in
so pretty soon
Bill appeared
and he'd been
drinking
but he wasn't
too bad
and he said
hello
and he said
and everything
and he's kind of
raging around
and he made
an excuse
he had a
glass of
and he went
out and got
some ice cream
something else
for supper
and
well if I know
where he's going
I said
I've done it
for money
time
and stuff
so
then Lois
came in
and there was
another girl
invited
there was a girl
invited
because she
lived upstairs
and had made
the place
an apartment
so we all
sat down
to dinner
and Bill
got a little
garbled
in the book
about
again across
the kitchen
table
but
you know
it didn't make
any difference
the idea
is there
so we got
dinner
and then we all
moved upstairs
and those houses
and back there
in the eastmost
living room
was on the
second floor
so we moved up
on the second floor
and after a little
hammering and hollering
Lois said
well
don't care about
yourself
so I started
in
I guess they got
me wound up
and I guess
I talked
to put there
one o'clock
in the morning
and I remember
Bill
said I walked
the subway
with her
and I knew
that he wasn't
going to go
for a drink
or
that he had
a bottle
in the house
anyway
and on the way
over
he put his
arms around
my shoulder
just before
I went in
the subway
and said
I don't know
what you got
kid
but you got
something
and I want
to get it
well he didn't
stop drinking
right away
any more
than I had
stopped drinking
back there
that summer
when my
doctor
group
was trying
to see me
but the idea
was in there
and the idea
happened to
get in
Bill's head
and at
that time
I had
moved to
a mission
on 1st
Avenue
and 23rd
Street
New York
City
it was
run by
Calvary
Episcopal
Church
it was
called
Calvary
Mission
and it
was run
under the
offices
of this
Oxford
group
it was
just a
typical
so-called
Bowery
Mission
we had
12 men
who were
running it
and
uh
excuse me
we only
had available
beds for
about 35
men
and they
were full
every night
so
when I
was living
there
and about
two nights
after I
had been
over to
see Bill
he appeared
at the
mission
just as
the meeting
was about
to start
he had a
guy in
tow
and they
were both
visibly
drunk
well not
too bad
I was
long about
there was
great money
those meetings
there were
called
testimonials
we had
a man
up on
the platform
and
he would
call on
various men
in the audience
they'd get up
say what
they'd found
of course
most of them
were doing it
just to get
a place to
sleep
they called
taking a
motorbike
for God
to get a
flop
that's the
way they
expressed it
well in the
midst of all
these proceedings
Bill gets up
and walks up
to the platform
and he's about
6'3
and all
he leaves
his elbow
on the
piano
and he
starts to
pout
and the
superintendent
says
get him
down
let's
pull him
down
out of
there
it's a
long
go
let's
see what
he's
got to
say
the guy
gave him
a dirty
look
when he
let Bill
talk
and then
two or
three days
later
this was
sometime
late in
November
as I've
been talking
to Jim
and Dick
and some
of the
other boys
I wish
that either
Bill or I
or somebody
kept a diary
back there
so that we
could remember
dates and
have some
continuity
to our
stories
because you
go back
24 years
and you
count out
to the
last year
a call
thing
accurately
so this
was sometime
late in
November
in
1934
and it's
a few
days later
that Bill
got himself
a taxi cab
and two or
three bottles
of beer
and went up
to Towns
Hospital
in Central
Park West
and when I
heard he was
up there
I guess
it was the
next day
I went up
to see him
because I
made up
my mind
that having
started this
with Bill
it was up
to me
to
take it
out
which I
think is
a true
thing
in every
AA
12 step
case you
go on
if you're
going to
do it
don't
spread
yourself
too thin
and take
on 25
or 30
people
I'd rather
see you
concentrate
on one
or two
I don't
know whether
I'm my
brother's
keeper or
not
but I
do think
that if
you start
and put
something in
a man's
mind
and possibly
in his
heart and
soul
you've got
to stick
with him
to his
tough spots
as well
as his
victories
you're the
one who
started
it and
it's up
to you
to see
what he
gets on
the street
so I
followed Bill
up up
there and
we had
some talks
and he
got out
and went
back down
around Wall
Street and
wanted to
make a few
little moves
in there
and I
kept
riding
hard on
him
and I
rode hard
on him
and I
and he
came around
when he
began to
attend
Oxford group
meetings
which I
might add
are exactly
the same
as AA
meetings
they had
a speaker
I mean a
leader
that's what
they called
it
they didn't
call it
chairman
they called
it the
leader
on three
or four
speakers
and Bill
spoke many
times from
Calvary House
from Gramercy
Park North
in New York
City
and later
on
when we
slipped from
the Oxford
group
and became
Alcoholics
Anonymous
we went
back to
that place
and had
our meetings
there up
to about
two years
ago
the original
Manhattan
group
now of
course
Ohio
Cleveland
and one
of the
other cities
claim that
they are
the original
AA
but I
don't know
I kind
of
dispute
a little
bit
because
there was
a clear
succession
right through
from the
Oxford group
meetings
until the
time we
broke off
and the
meetings
went to
that and
Bill's
house
and then
they went
to
Steinway
Hall
on 57th
Street
and from
there to
Burke
Taylor's
shop
on 5th
Avenue
and we
occupied
one of
the floors
of the
Taylor's
shop
and
let's
see
the
then
there's
a
direct
succession
but I
don't
care
whether
it's
Cleveland
or
anybody
else
claims
their
first
group
it
makes
little
difference
the
thing
got
started
so
Bill
and I
were
together
a great
deal
that
first
murder
and then
I went
back to
Albany
in
1936
and
Bill
went on
to
found
AA
and
he
and
he's
really
the one
I just
had
something
to do
with
giving
him
the
idea
he
went
on
to
Dr.
Bob
found
AA
and
in
1937
I had
a slip
I fell
off the
wagon
after two
years and
seven
months
which was
slightly
different
from that
DuPont film
the DuPont
film had
me falling
off a
month after
I talked
to Bill
but that
wasn't
so
I was
two
months
two
years
six
months
later
and
I've
had to
go through
the trouble
off and
on
if I
want to
go back
and count
the years
I can
count
possibly
15 years
a complete
sobriety
out of
the 24
maybe 16
years
but they
were the
longest
of 16
months
and 8
months
and 7
months
and so
on
and
the
summer
of 1953
out of
the
dinner
New York
City
drinking
and I
walked
into
the
intergroup
one day
and
Hazel Wright
one of the
secretaries
there said
I think
I've got a
man that
can help
you
he's got
something real
and something
tangible
and she
said I'm
going to
call him
right away
and she
called this
man
who came
down
to see
me
he says
where do
you drink
and I
said
around
third
of
minutes
12
let's
go
and he
said
I
ran
into
people
Graves
a man
who
originally
came to
see
you
he said
how's
old
Evie
doing
this
guy
said
I
don't
know
Evie
but I
hear
he's
not
doing
at
all
so
he
said
Steve
told
me
that
you
didn't
have
a
chance
here
in
New
York
and we
don't
think
you
have
I
said
I
know
damn
well
I
haven't
been
licked
I
can't
throw
it
off
he
said
how
about
going
to
Texas
well
I
said
I
don't
know
about
that
well
he
expounded
on the
virtues
of
Texas
and the
good
old
American
ways
of
living
that
were
still
down
in
these
parts
of
the
country
he
gave
me
five
dollars
and bought
me
another
drink
and said
I'll
see
you
tomorrow
night
so
he
did
and
approved
the
performance
and of
course
I
worked
in
for
another
five
dollars
that's
for
sure
and
a
few
more
I
was
badly
needed
and
I
that
night
he
called
up
Oli
Lancaster
and
Dallas
and said
how
about
taking
this
guy
down
there
alright
he
said
send
me
out
you
son
of
a
bitch
of
Dallas
I
could
hear
Oli
booming
it
out
so
the
next
we
got
a
reservation
that
night
American
Airlines
the
Sunday
evening
and it
was the
Sunday
before
Labor
Day
September
6th
and the
dirty
soul
and soul
never
even
gave
me
a
drink
after
three
I
got
off
that
plane
and I
was the
first
person
out
of
it
and
I
had
enough
flying
for
one
night
and I
got
down
there
and I
looked
around
and I
saw
two
big
guys
and of
course
I was
having
hallucinations
all over
the place
and I
said
they're
either a
couple
of
demons
or a
couple
of
goons
from
some
gangster
squad
and then
I heard
that
booming
voice
again
there's
the
achy
bastard
there he
is
I've
seen
him
in
New
York
so
they
got a
hold of
him
and I
pulled
him
in a
car
and put
me
down
to
Texas
Clinic
and I
stayed
there
I guess
I stayed
there
all
together
about
two
three
months
but the
first
two
or three
weeks
it was
pretty
rugged
I didn't
dare go
out of
the place
one of
the girls
there that
was taking
care of
the books
and sort
of running
things took
me downtown
one day
and I
couldn't
get back
in that
place fast
enough
I was
scared of
the car
the traffic
I was
scared of
everything
and it
wasn't
I was
there two
weeks later
the guy
said I'm
going out
to mail
some letters
to the
airport
do you
want to
go out
and I
said I
sure do
I want
to see
this
airport
and see
if I'm
really
in
Dallas
when I
got out
then I
got out
of the
car and
I walked
up to
this
placard
it said
Love
Field
Dallas
Texas
I put
my hand
on it
and I
said alright
I'm in
Dallas
I believe
it
I stand
here I
did not
believe I
was in
Dallas
because
it's been
a pretty
rugged
and a
pretty
hot
summer
and I
haven't
had much
to eat
in those
three months
I was
thinking
everything
I could
lay my
hands
on
meant to
be cut
short
like that
furthermore
they gave
me a few
goofballs
on there
and I
hate those
things
anyway
I hate
the effect
of them
I just
like
these
I'm
sorry
that I've
taken up
so much
time
telling you
it's all
been on
myself
but I
didn't know
how to
bring the
history
of A.A.
and you've
all seen
how it
spread
how it
worked
I know
that if it
hadn't been
for A.A.
when I
got to
Texas
I never
would have
been able
to survive
and just
coming out
here alone
I'd have
been
lost
I'd have
lost
it was
tough enough
as it was
because I
was among
strange people
slightly
different ways
than ours
it was
enough evil
to get
from a
bowery
down here
in six
hours
and change
yourself
all around
but if it
hadn't been
for those
good Texas
people
and the
people in
the suburban
club
if I
hadn't been
able to
go around
there and
stay there
and shake
after two
weeks before
I went in
the club
it would
have been
a little
over two
weeks
I walked
by it
one day
and started
up the
sets
lost
my nerve
and went
back to
the clinic
almost like
a guy
going back
and hiding
under the
bed
and I
know
the trouble
times
they said
well I
heard him
talking
I don't
know what
we're going
to do
with this
guy
he's
gone
goofy
and then
I heard
a colored
girl that
worked
there
she's
quite an
old
woman
and she
said
don't
you
worry
about
that
man
you just
leave him
alone
and he's
sick
mentally
and physically
and gradually
I worked
out of it
nature
took over
and then
I was
able to
get around
the club
and get
into the
activities
and maybe
I got
in too
fast
that was
the hottest
summer
that had
been on
record
in the
Texas
Weather Bureau
I went
down on
the ranch
and I
was
working
the sheep
with this
man
and he
put me
in as a
shoot man
and that's
kind of
rugged
working
95 degree
day
and I
got mixed
up in
a
oil deal
and I
sold some
insurance
stock
and every
one of
them
flopped
insurance
company
did
almost
and I
was still
struggling
to get
back on
the street
and I
got in
another deal
and that
flopped
I was sober
a year
and one
month after
the year
was up
I flopped
and that
was in
October
1954
and that
13 months
and I
only had
a few
days
drinking
then
and
there was
over
a three
week
period
but I
got slapped
in the
county
jail
for ten
days
and that
was
Mr.
Bill
Becker's
emporium
and I
came out
and some
friends
took me
in their
house
and I
sobered
up
and I
haven't
had a
drink
since
in other
words
I've
had about
five years
of sobriety
in Texas
out of five
years and one
month I've
had five
years of
sobriety
total
and I
know
that I'm
grateful to
see the
graves
over
there
in Paris
and Charlie
for following
it up
and for
the people
in Texas
and over
here
all of
you people
who have
given me
another
chance
I
couldn't
have done
it by
myself
it isn't
under my
own
feeling
and I
know
that my
sobriety
in these
four years
these last
four years
that I've
been sober
it hasn't
been my
sole effort
that's kept
me sober
nor do I
believe it
has been
in
entirely the
friendship
and the
help of
people
I think
it was
then
the help
of a
higher
power
and while
I've lost
that idea
some
times
along
this way
of life
thank God
I got it
back again
because I
know that
I couldn't
exist without
it
there are
times when
I know
I'm not
like the
great many
people I
hear
talk
that
they say
there isn't
a
day in
their lives
that they
don't fight
the desire
to take a
drink
well I'm
telling you
right now
flat out
I'd go
get drunk
I couldn't
be that much
of a hero
to fight it
every day
and every
hour
I don't
have that
but I do
have
periods
every three
or four
months
when it's
maybe two
or three
days
that's all
I think
about
you've
taken a
drink
and if I
haven't
got myself
conditioned
to the
correct way
of thinking
and knowing
that if I
take that
drink
well I'm
going to
end up
I have
no doubt
that this
time I
know that
that last
drink
that the
liquor
knocked me
so badly
physically
and mentally
too that
I'd never
survive another
one
and I get
that in my
head and I
keep it there
and fight
for the fact
that I want
to go out
and I get
sick of this
being in
harness every
day and
going to
work
and I'm
getting along
in years
and I like
to have a
little rest
once in a
while but I
gotta go
to work
and I'm
and I often
think if I
come home
tonight if I
could take
one good
fudge of
whiskey or
one bottle
of
Valentine's
Ale and
go eat
it would
help me
a lot and
it probably
would help
me physically
and give
me a lift
but I
know I
can't do
it so
what is
the use
of time
or the
idea
I don't
quite get
so much
the idea
that I
used to
and I'd
like to
get drunk
although that
occurs once
in a while
because I
think in
every one
of us
there's
another
person
who's an
alter ego
and that
old drunk
that goes
every
batch
are still
in there
he may
be
dormant
but he's
there
just like
a volcano
he takes
his top
off and
he goes
zoom
or in
this time
he goes
zoom
boom
and I
haven't
got anything
much more
to say
except
stick to
your
A.A.
and stick
to God
and I
think that
you'll
find
the
if you're
having any
trouble
you'll find
help there
I want to
thank Dick
and I want
to thank
the other
members
and all
you people
who've
entertained
me
and I
sure have
enjoyed
coming to
Memphis
thank you
and Hal
and the
boys
are
passing
the remittance
basket
and
I want to
say again
if you happen
to go out
Texas way
where
Ebby has
been
and where
Ebby has
been the
last five
years
the A.A.
out there
is no
different
from the
A.A.
that you
have here
in Memphis
Tennessee
because my
first visit
to Memphis
was in
1935
when you
first organized
and you were
getting together
then
and one of
the great
pleasures of
A.A.
was to
walk in
and see
men and
women
right in
this audience
here tonight
who were
here
and
active
in
35
that are
here
and
active
tonight
everyone
that comes
in
A.A.
just
doesn't
walk
in
bless
themselves
and stay
sober
you have
a disease
called
alcoholism
and it's
a tough
one
some
people
are
lucky
I don't
know
I don't
know
who I
shot
whose
mother-in-law
or mine
that I
pushed
down
stairs
and I
don't
know
who I
shot
that gave
me the
right
I can
never
grasp
even
this
today
why
should
I
stay
sober
and
some
other
guy
didn't
he's
an
alcoholic
just
like
I
am
I
don't
know
what
it
is
I'm
not
going
to
try
to
answer
but
I
do
know
this
as
long
as
you
remember
yesterday
it's
a great
help
for
tomorrow
you're
quick
when
you
forgive
yourself
you're
quick
when
you're
going
to
get
well
but
when
you
forget
where
you
found
your
sobriety
how
you
got
sober
and
you
retire
of
the
country
club
and
no
longer
are
active
in
AA
you
are
no
longer
taking
your
medicine
and
if
you
don't
take
your
medicine
someday
down
the
road
oh
you
can
point
to
me
as
every
can
I
can
show
you
guys
that
are
sober
5
6
7
8
10
years
that
never
show
up
anymore
they're
not
dead
yet
I
know
a lot
of
people
with
different
diseases
that
have
arrested
them
you
can
arrest
your
alcoholism
and
maybe
you
can
stay
sober
if
you
never
come
back
to
AA
and
if
you
never
come
back
to
AA
I'm
one
that
will
never
miss
it
because
if
you're
ungrateful
as that
for
what
you
found
I
don't
think
me
personally
that
I
would
lose
it
and
I'm
only
speaking
for
myself
because
you
found
it
I
found
it
and
I
think
today
the
greatest
thought
that we
can
have
in
Alcoholics
Anonymous
not
for
you
who
are
so
lucky
that
are
here
tonight
and
all
over
the
world
in
AA
with
God
and
his
infinite
wisdom
gave
us
the
privilege
of
staying
sober
such
as
we
are
tonight
and
I
turn
my
back
on
the
guy
I
don't
deserve
to
buy
that's
merely
my
own
opinion
I
belong
to
the
greatest
fellowship
in
the
world
and
that
fellowship
is
called
Alcoholics
Anonymous
everything
I have
tonight
everything
I will
ever get
any other
night
from here
in
come
from
men
and
women
God
bless
you
just
like
you
may
I
always
be
with
you
and
may
someday
I
really
be
worthy
of
you
in
all
meetings
all
over
the
country
those
who
wish
to
join
us
we
close
by
saying
we
are
fathers
those
who
care
will
you
join
us
our
father
who
art
in
heaven
hallowed
be
thy
name
thy
kingdom
come
thy
will
be
done
on
earth
as
it is
in
heaven
give
us
this
day
our
daily
bread
and
forgive
us
our
trespass
as
we
forgive
those
who
trespass
against
us
and
lead
us
not
into
temptation
but
deliver
us
from
evil
the
line
of
the
sea
the
power
and
the
glory
forever
and ever
amen
I've been fortunate in knowing Eddie for 17 years.
That's the length of time I know Bill, too.
I met Eddie 17 years ago.
Bill met him almost 24 years ago.
Bill, take, call it what you will, grace of God, but wait not for the man that you're
about to hear.
You wouldn't be having this meeting tonight because he's the first guy that brought the
message to our boy Bill.
If you've read the book Alcoholics Anonymous, and I know that most of you have, in there
you'll hear in Bill's story, always referring to my friend.
And then in the later book, describing Alcoholics Anonymous and other stories that just came
out some short time ago, the name Ebby comes out.
But always in the first book, you'll hear him referred to as my friend.
Should you hear a lot of us at different times and in different parts of the country,
according to how Bill came in, how the organization or the fellowship started, there's only
one man in the world tonight who knows exactly how it started, because he was sober and Bill
was drunk.
So, I give you my friend and your friend, our founder.
Ebby.
Thank you, Dick.
I was a big soldier.
My name is Ebby, and I'm an alcoholic.
I don't know if this is how to start this off.
Dick asked me over here.
I was very glad to come.
It's an honor.
You're not coming to Memphis, people.
Well, I had an idea.
I was one of two or three speakers, and I didn't know I was going to hold this thing
down for 40 or 45 minutes.
Back home in Dallas, I'm known as the world's shortest speaker.
They used me back there on the different clothes for the 10-minute and 15-minute spots.
So, I don't know if that's how I'm going to go about holding down for 45 minutes, but
I do the best I can.
In fact, I've been living in Texas for five years now.
Maybe I've got a job.
Maybe I've got a job.
Maybe I've got a job.
I've gotten enough of that Texas braggadocio somewhere in my system.
Maybe I was so affluent that I can pull some of that out of the hack.
There's a story I heard a year or two after I got in Dallas.
It's called the take-away hacking.
I hope you'll indulge me and let me tell it.
There was a Texas rancher who drove over to his nearest neighbor.
It was about 15 miles.
He said, what do you say we go to town and make a day?
Yeah, but that's all right.
Got his hat and he got in the car and he started out.
As soon as he got out of the side of the ranch house, he opened up and searched the boardroom.
Had a good long pull on the bottle and the first guy said, you know,
there was a ship 2,000 bulls from Fort Worth the day before yesterday.
Nothing was said.
They drove on a while and came to a gate and they had to open that.
They had another pull at the bottle and the second guy said, you know,
I shipped 2,500 bulls.
From my side, I mean, four or five days ago.
And they drove along just before they got to the main state highway.
They stopped for a third good hooker.
The first rancher said again, you know, I think we're the two biggest bull shippers in Texas.
And I hope I've acquired a little of that so I can spread it out tonight.
I know that Drake and...
Jim Drake and some of the other boys
wanted me to tell you some of the beginnings of
AA as I experienced them.
And you know, I think that
I appreciate the things that Dick has said and other people have said about me.
But I sometimes think it might be
claim to fame as an exhibit A in the antique division of alcoholics in Baltimore.
That's about it.
Well, I got to go.
And back to some of my beginnings.
I started drinking when I was in school.
I come from Auburn in New York.
It's my native town.
Went to a private school there.
I started drinking last year.
I seemed to hold it under control pretty well.
I did get off on a wild party one night.
It was a military school.
We had a competitive drill.
After the drill, I went out and met with some of us.
Went out and got drunk.
And we got in a mess.
And the principal of the school heard about it.
But nothing was said.
But I, uh...
I wasn't very well that spring.
And they took me out of school before.
School was over.
And that summer, the principal wrote to his father.
And he always called me Ed.
He didn't call me Ebby or Eb.
He said, I don't think we can do anything more for Ed.
It's not that he was just telling me from school.
So that fall, my father said,
you're going to work in the foundry.
My father happened to be in the iron foundry business.
So I went to work that fall.
And, uh, I confined my drinking to Saturday night.
Naturally, I had to get up at six o'clock to go down.
I worked as a motorist helper.
Which is fairly rugged work, as you may know.
And I did that for a year.
And I confined most of my drinking to Saturday.
Except around Christmas time when all the dances were going on.
Then I really stepped out.
And I remember I tried to go to work.
Drinking and dancing and getting down to work at seven o'clock in the morning.
But I was young.
And you shake it off and work it off by night.
And I managed to get away with it for a while.
But as I look back and remember those times,
I wasn't a very successful drinker from the start.
There were times...
There were times, too, when I'd take some of the older guys around all of me home.
And other times, I'd be climbing the chandelier.
I'd have three or four drinks.
I never knew what was going to happen.
In fact, the matter is, when I was about 15 years old,
I remember putting a lot of thought into this business of drinking
because it was in my family.
My brothers drank pretty heavily.
My father did.
And, uh...
I kind of figured that...
They drank that way.
And it wasn't any good for them.
And it was no good for me, either,
because I was just about the same compromise as they were.
But it was that first drink that I ever took on my own
when I walked into the bar of the hotel tonight in Auburn
and ordered a glass of beer all by myself.
And I was a big shot.
And I still say that was the best glass of beer I ever tasted.
Sometimes I can almost taste it again.
And somehow, that...
That just gave me just the same...
The same glow.
And, uh...
That beer was a lot stronger in those days.
And it was real beer.
That was about 1914, I think.
19...
Yes, it was 1914.
And I know that I said to myself,
this is for me.
And soon after that, when I started drinking,
I kept it down pretty well at two or three drinks.
I used to grab...
Uh...
Of an evening that spring,
uh...
Um, this friend of mine, I went to school.
He called me up and asked me if I had my lessons done.
I said, sure.
I guess it was just a fall
because the family was sitting in the room.
And I said, sure, Andy.
I'll go out and have a chug of milk with you.
I got time.
And we were far from chugging milk.
But I managed to get home by 11 o'clock,
so there was nobody knowing about it.
But I know that the effect and the taste of alcohol
was fascinating to me from the beginning.
And later on, I read
a book called
The Common Sense of Drinking
from which a lot of AA was taken
by Dick Peabody.
He's not dead,
but he was one of the first of the
lay therapists that
had a tremendous following of alcoholics.
A lot of other books have been written
by a lot of his pupils.
The Glass Crutch is one of them
by Dutch Chambers, and I can name a half of those.
I can't think of them right now.
But he said in that book,
that the difference between an alcoholic
and a heavy drinker was
that the heavy drinker
might drink just as much
on a given night as the alcoholic,
but the next day was another day to him,
and he went to work,
and his first thing in the...
awakening in the morning was the office.
Well, the first step that the alcoholic had
was on the night before,
and where could he get the next drink
to bring that party back again?
And that always appealed to me
because that's the way I was.
I'd forget business
and want to get somewhere
where I could get with the gang again.
And he said the effect of alcohol
on people of your type
is too fast and urgent.
You can't handle it.
But I knew that...
But I knew then
that a couple of days
worth of drinking in my family,
I figured out
that I better lay...
sit and stay away from it,
but I never did
once I had that drink.
And as time went on,
I, of course,
got into a lot more trouble.
And the family business broke up
as one of those things do.
It's been running since 1852,
and it broke up in 1922.
And I was more or less on the loose
and...
Yeah.
From one job to another.
And getting in more trouble all the time.
And the drinking was increasing.
I didn't get overseas in World War I,
but I was in the outfit
that was stationed around
right in my hometown of Albany.
And in the state armory there,
I got to be a second lieutenant
in this outfit,
and we always had a jug
in the officer's quarters
because it was a drugget
in one of the corners
right near the armory.
And I always...
And somehow,
I managed to get a barrel of whiskey,
and we could get it there
because those were the days of prescription.
The doctor would issue you a prescription
during probation,
and you'd go in and get this
pint of whiskey,
but we got it all we wanted.
We got that gallon jug filled
repeatedly.
And I was a pretty two-fisted drinking crowd,
and they were all older than I was.
And finally,
we got into a jam one night.
We got in a taxi wreck,
and I just got superficial cuts,
and I just got superficial cuts,
in my both wrist and in my face.
But I was kind of a bloody mess.
I was just bleeding a lot,
and my father came in.
I was sitting on the bed,
and he said,
you get out of that
National Guard tomorrow morning,
and you leave my house.
Well, I didn't feel like
leaving this house last night,
so late that afternoon,
I walked up and told the captain
I was going to resign,
requested to be put on the reserve.
So that ended my National Guard career,
and that's the phase of the drinking.
Well, things got worse,
and my father and mother died in 27,
my father in 29.
And I was sticking around then pretty bad.
I inherited some money from my father.
I should have had sense enough
to take care of it,
but I didn't.
I lost half of it overnight
in the stock market trash,
and the rest I just found to drain
over a period of a year,
a year and a half.
And we used to summer in Vermont,
and it was there that I met Bill Wilson,
but it was longer ago
than 24 years ago.
I first knew Bill about 1910.
I went to school with him in 1912,
which has taken us back
quite a few years.
And as we get back,
we went to Summers
and the mansion in Vermont.
Well, after my father died,
the house was vacant up there,
and we bought a house
after all the years
that father had spent money
at the hotel for all of us.
He bought a house in 1923,
and in 1929 he died,
and the house was empty.
All my other brothers were married.
Father died without a will,
so they just divided up the furniture
and had to come for me,
and I had one room furnished in that house,
and the rest was bare.
And I was living there all alone,
drinking heavily all the time.
Got ready,
and then we jumped out,
and now we're going to get up
to the summer of 1934.
This was 24 years ago.
And I'd been on the toils of the law
twice that summer.
I'd gotten drunk,
gotten arrested for being drunk and disorderly,
fined $5 or something like that.
And it seems that in Vermont at that time,
I don't know whether the law
is still on the statute books or not,
but if you got arrested three times
at any one given year for drunkenness,
it meant six months in Windsor State Prison.
Well, I was getting drunk right along.
One time I got drunk,
and I still don't know exactly how it happened,
but I was in my own house,
and finally somebody got out a wire for me.
I still don't see yet what I was doing.
I thought I was on my own property.
But one of the boys,
a boy that was constable at the time,
was a guy that I'd gone to school with in 1912,
and he said,
I went to school the same year
that I went to school with Bill Wilson.
I forgot to say that I went to a private school in Albany,
but this one year I went up there in Vermont
in 1912,
in the fall of 1912,
to go to that school
from one year and then back to my other.
And this other boy was John Jackson.
He was constable.
And I walked uptown the next day.
Well, I went up and sat on the store,
the steps of the hardware store
that's out to the owner of it.
My son John drove up and said,
sorry, he says,
everybody got a warrant for you.
Got to take you down to Bennington,
which is a county city.
He took me down and saw the judge.
And the judge says,
be back Monday.
He said, well,
let's see what we can do about you.
Well, I've gotten ahead of my story
because before that,
I'd say late in July
or the first part of August,
two men came to see me,
two fellas that I had drunk with often.
And one of them happened to be
the son of this judge.
His name is Steve McGraves
and he's now living in Paris, France.
And the other one is Chet Cornell
and I don't know just where he is.
I think he's somewhere in Ohio.
And I had a hangover, of course,
and these two guys wanted around.
I was out and back somewhere
in the kitchen, I guess.
I remember they came up the back steps.
And they started,
they didn't know exactly how to begin on me
because they remembered me
and I had a lot of fun with me drinking.
And I saw they had something on their mind,
so I said, well,
what do you got on your mind?
What's cooking?
And they said, well,
we kind of come and see you
and said we couldn't
get some idea into your head
about something.
I said, you mean about my drinking?
And they said, yeah,
you're not getting anywhere.
I understand you're in wrong all over town.
And we just sort of,
well, we just sort of,
we got mixed up with a group
called the Oxford Group.
And we thought that you could get help
if you joined up with us.
And they said,
you ever think of letting God run your life
instead of every pastor trying to run it all the time?
And they really talked sense
the way I figured it,
and it seemed to me
that they were just telling me things
that I hadn't.
I'd been taught in my childhood
about the right way of living.
And I said, well,
gee, if these two guys
have got something out of this,
maybe there's hope for me
because I've just about given up hope.
And I said, I was willing to quit drinking
but I didn't know how.
Excuse me.
I didn't know how to do it.
So I listened to them
and they left me a book
by one of these men in the Oxford Group.
I don't recall the name of that book now.
But in it,
I could see myself staring out of those pages.
Now, the Oxford Group, let me explain,
was not concentrated on alcohol.
Alcoholism.
It was a spiritual group
that was founded by
a minister from Pennsylvania
named Frank Bookman,
B-U-C-H-M-A-N.
It got its name Oxford Group
because it was a group
because Bookman got a lot of people interested
and they in turn went abroad
and they went to England
and Oxford University
and they got a lot of people interested over there.
And from there,
they went to South Africa.
And they got quite a big meeting down there.
I don't know if it was Cape Town
or one of those cities.
And the reporters referred to them
as the group from Oxford
and that damn name stuck
and it had no more to do
with the group or its foundings
than anything in the world.
But just like those things happen,
that's the name it stuck in.
And it was called the Oxford Group.
And they were really
trying to find something.
It was that time in 1929
when the crash had come on Wall Street
and the nation was kind of a low point economically.
A lot of people were hopping out of windows in New York
and that's no joke because they were.
A lot of them hit those manholes
head-on from the 30th floor.
And a lot of people were drinking terribly
and they wanted to find something
in this Oxford Group.
A lot of people came around to it
and of course a good many of them
happened to be alcoholics.
And don't ever let yourself think
that nobody but an alcoholic
can help an alcoholic
because there were a lot of men
in this group who were very understanding
and had a damn good knowledge
of the thinkings of an alcoholic's mind.
And I sometimes think
that our minds are no different
than anybody else in this world.
We just give in to things
that other people do not.
Well, anyway, that idea appealed to me.
I read the book
and I filled it up for a few days
and I started to paint the house
but I had a ladder that was too short
and I couldn't get up to all these places.
And I made a deal with a boss painter
and he sent around one of his men
with some equipment
and the two of us finished the house.
I didn't touch the drop all that time
but the minute that job was over
sure I went right back to the bottle
because I had nothing more to interest me.
It was a letdown.
And it was then
I met Minge after the
thing in the house that I was picked up
and taken to this county judge.
There's one thing that sticks in my mind
and it always will.
I knew it would at that time.
It may not mean anything to you.
You may not get what I mean by it
but as we drove home,
I knew it would.
As we drove home that afternoon
this constable, John Jackson,
left me off at the house that I was living in
and he said,
well, I'll be around to get you Monday.
This was Friday.
And he said,
remember the judge says be sober.
I said, yep, I'll be sober.
So I went in the house
and I remembered that down cellar
I had about a half a dozen bottles of ale
and I know that they're going to be nice and cool.
And the one thing I like in this world
is Valentine's Ale.
And that was it.
So I went down cellar
and I said to myself,
I can't possibly get drunk
between now and Monday
on six bottles of ale.
And I know that nobody in town
is going to sell me anymore
if they've heard that I...
You know what a small Vermont community is.
Everybody from ten miles up and down the valley
knows all about anything like that.
And I knew another...
I mean, the bootlegger wouldn't tell me anything.
And I got down
and I reached one of those bottles
and uh-uh.
That ain't crooked.
All right, the judge said
you'd get there sober,
but you'd be there sober.
No, that isn't.
That's cheating.
That's somehow...
And I walked back upstairs
and that damn devil's
up on my shoulder.
Get off.
Go on down there and take it.
I couldn't take that damn ale.
That's just not...
That's not...
That's not the spirit of the thing.
It might be...
Technically, I might be all right.
I'd get there sober
expecting it,
but that's not exactly what he meant.
He didn't say don't take a drink,
but that's exactly what he meant.
So I took them
and put them in a basket
and carried them over
to my next-door neighbor
and I said,
here, they're yours.
And that minute,
I had a victory.
I know that.
I had something
that was just like a weight
being lifted from my shoulders.
And I've often thought about it
in later years
when I started drinking again
why I couldn't
recapture that feeling
that I had then.
And I said,
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
So that's that.
That's the
drink cloud.
And later on,
you
can get a more
mature,
if I may use the word,
outlook.
But I don't think
if you have a slip,
you can ever
go back again.
Well,
as it turned out,
I went down there Monday
and there had been
a third man
come to see me, too.
His name was
Roland Hazard.
And he was a pretty
swell gent, too.
I never knew him.
I never met him before.
These other two guys
I had.
And he was there
on Monday
when I was brought
for the judge.
The judge started
to give me
a little luck here
and he said,
Hazard,
will you
take this man
and lease this door?
So I was released
and my own
recognizance
and
the charges
were dropped.
And this guy
put me in.
He took me back home
and left me there.
And a few days later
I closed the house up
and went down
and stayed with him.
He lived about
15 miles below
south of the town.
And then we went
on down to New York.
And I stayed
with Chuck Cornell
and one of his other
chaps
that had come to see me.
I stayed there
about a month,
I guess.
And during that time
we made trips
back to Vermont
Hazard and I
and
two weeks after
I was there,
I was connected
with a factor group
by which
there's a much
looser membership
than Alcoholics Anonymous.
I really think.
I went,
they got me out
speaking.
The first weekend
that I went out
speaking,
we went up
through Vermont.
I spoke in a junior
college,
two churches,
a town meeting hall,
and someplace else
all in two nights.
Two afternoons
and two nights.
And I still
don't know
what I talked about.
But I just
felt good
about the whole thing
and
really figured
that these guys
must have something.
That there must be
a higher power
because they were
the ones
that originally
say
believe in
a higher God
or a higher power
as you understand it.
And
as well,
I was doing this
and going back
to New York
and
I heard about Bill.
I hadn't seen Bill
I don't believe
for over a year
although Bill
you see
was born and raised
in a town
six miles north
of this town
of Manchester, Vermont
where I used to
summer.
Also spent quite a few
winters there.
And I heard
that Bill
was in pretty tough shape
drinking bad
and I
had been downtown
in Wall Street
and seen some
of my old friends
one of whom
I had built
a sister-in-law
and he said
he was in tough shape
and he said
why don't you
give him a ring
or a telephone?
And I said
well I will
but I want to
think this thing out
a little
and get myself
a pretty good store
and a pretty good
pick to get for him.
And I can
truthfully say now
that I believe
that if I
went over there
Bill would either
go for it
lock, stock and barrel
or he would have
none of it.
He wouldn't just
play around with it
for a little while
I thought that
if he put his teeth
under it once
he'd stick to it.
But I
thought
I knew him
pretty well
I've been going
to school with him
and seen him
over the years
so I called him
up one night
and I didn't get
to Bill
but I got lost
his wife
and
told her
what had happened
to me
that this
must have
kind of
shown me
something
well I don't
even sober myself
in about
five possibly
six or seven weeks
but I think
sometimes
the initial
effect
that we get
from a thing
is we're more
powerful than
we are later on
we get stale
well anyway
Lois said
let's go over
to dinner
that night
and
since he's
much in debate
I said fine
so that night
I went over
that
half past five
I guess
in the evening
and
I rang
the bell
at 182
Clinton Street
the only
person home
was an old
colored man
named Green
who I've known
for years
he'd been with
the family
and Lois'
family
and others
and he said
they're both out
both Mrs. Wilson
and Mr. Wilson
and I
would come on in
so pretty soon
Bill appeared
and he'd been
drinking
but he wasn't
too bad
and he said
hello
and he said
and everything
and he's kind of
raging around
and he made
an excuse
he had a
glass of
and he went
out and got
some ice cream
something else
for supper
and
well if I know
where he's going
I said
I've done it
for money
time
and stuff
so
then Lois
came in
and there was
another girl
invited
there was a girl
invited
because she
lived upstairs
and had made
the place
an apartment
so we all
sat down
to dinner
and Bill
got a little
garbled
in the book
about
again across
the kitchen
table
but
you know
it didn't make
any difference
the idea
is there
so we got
dinner
and then we all
moved upstairs
and those houses
and back there
in the eastmost
living room
was on the
second floor
so we moved up
on the second floor
and after a little
hammering and hollering
Lois said
well
don't care about
yourself
so I started
in
I guess they got
me wound up
and I guess
I talked
to put there
one o'clock
in the morning
and I remember
Bill
said I walked
the subway
with her
and I knew
that he wasn't
going to go
for a drink
or
that he had
a bottle
in the house
anyway
and on the way
over
he put his
arms around
my shoulder
just before
I went in
the subway
and said
I don't know
what you got
kid
but you got
something
and I want
to get it
well he didn't
stop drinking
right away
any more
than I had
stopped drinking
back there
that summer
when my
doctor
group
was trying
to see me
but the idea
was in there
and the idea
happened to
get in
Bill's head
and at
that time
I had
moved to
a mission
on 1st
Avenue
and 23rd
Street
New York
City
it was
run by
Calvary
Episcopal
Church
it was
called
Calvary
Mission
and it
was run
under the
offices
of this
Oxford
group
it was
just a
typical
so-called
Bowery
Mission
we had
12 men
who were
running it
and
uh
excuse me
we only
had available
beds for
about 35
men
and they
were full
every night
so
when I
was living
there
and about
two nights
after I
had been
over to
see Bill
he appeared
at the
mission
just as
the meeting
was about
to start
he had a
guy in
tow
and they
were both
visibly
drunk
well not
too bad
I was
long about
there was
great money
those meetings
there were
called
testimonials
we had
a man
up on
the platform
and
he would
call on
various men
in the audience
they'd get up
say what
they'd found
of course
most of them
were doing it
just to get
a place to
sleep
they called
taking a
motorbike
for God
to get a
flop
that's the
way they
expressed it
well in the
midst of all
these proceedings
Bill gets up
and walks up
to the platform
and he's about
6'3
and all
he leaves
his elbow
on the
piano
and he
starts to
pout
and the
superintendent
says
get him
down
let's
pull him
down
out of
there
it's a
long
go
let's
see what
he's
got to
say
the guy
gave him
a dirty
look
when he
let Bill
talk
and then
two or
three days
later
this was
sometime
late in
November
as I've
been talking
to Jim
and Dick
and some
of the
other boys
I wish
that either
Bill or I
or somebody
kept a diary
back there
so that we
could remember
dates and
have some
continuity
to our
stories
because you
go back
24 years
and you
count out
to the
last year
a call
thing
accurately
so this
was sometime
late in
November
in
1934
and it's
a few
days later
that Bill
got himself
a taxi cab
and two or
three bottles
of beer
and went up
to Towns
Hospital
in Central
Park West
and when I
heard he was
up there
I guess
it was the
next day
I went up
to see him
because I
made up
my mind
that having
started this
with Bill
it was up
to me
to
take it
out
which I
think is
a true
thing
in every
AA
12 step
case you
go on
if you're
going to
do it
don't
spread
yourself
too thin
and take
on 25
or 30
people
I'd rather
see you
concentrate
on one
or two
I don't
know whether
I'm my
brother's
keeper or
not
but I
do think
that if
you start
and put
something in
a man's
mind
and possibly
in his
heart and
soul
you've got
to stick
with him
to his
tough spots
as well
as his
victories
you're the
one who
started
it and
it's up
to you
to see
what he
gets on
the street
so I
followed Bill
up up
there and
we had
some talks
and he
got out
and went
back down
around Wall
Street and
wanted to
make a few
little moves
in there
and I
kept
riding
hard on
him
and I
rode hard
on him
and I
and he
came around
when he
began to
attend
Oxford group
meetings
which I
might add
are exactly
the same
as AA
meetings
they had
a speaker
I mean a
leader
that's what
they called
it
they didn't
call it
chairman
they called
it the
leader
on three
or four
speakers
and Bill
spoke many
times from
Calvary House
from Gramercy
Park North
in New York
City
and later
on
when we
slipped from
the Oxford
group
and became
Alcoholics
Anonymous
we went
back to
that place
and had
our meetings
there up
to about
two years
ago
the original
Manhattan
group
now of
course
Ohio
Cleveland
and one
of the
other cities
claim that
they are
the original
AA
but I
don't know
I kind
of
dispute
a little
bit
because
there was
a clear
succession
right through
from the
Oxford group
meetings
until the
time we
broke off
and the
meetings
went to
that and
Bill's
house
and then
they went
to
Steinway
Hall
on 57th
Street
and from
there to
Burke
Taylor's
shop
on 5th
Avenue
and we
occupied
one of
the floors
of the
Taylor's
shop
and
let's
see
the
then
there's
a
direct
succession
but I
don't
care
whether
it's
Cleveland
or
anybody
else
claims
their
first
group
it
makes
little
difference
the
thing
got
started
so
Bill
and I
were
together
a great
deal
that
first
murder
and then
I went
back to
Albany
in
1936
and
Bill
went on
to
found
AA
and
he
and
he's
really
the one
I just
had
something
to do
with
giving
him
the
idea
he
went
on
to
Dr.
Bob
found
AA
and
in
1937
I had
a slip
I fell
off the
wagon
after two
years and
seven
months
which was
slightly
different
from that
DuPont film
the DuPont
film had
me falling
off a
month after
I talked
to Bill
but that
wasn't
so
I was
two
months
two
years
six
months
later
and
I've
had to
go through
the trouble
off and
on
if I
want to
go back
and count
the years
I can
count
possibly
15 years
a complete
sobriety
out of
the 24
maybe 16
years
but they
were the
longest
of 16
months
and 8
months
and 7
months
and so
on
and
the
summer
of 1953
out of
the
dinner
New York
City
drinking
and I
walked
into
the
intergroup
one day
and
Hazel Wright
one of the
secretaries
there said
I think
I've got a
man that
can help
you
he's got
something real
and something
tangible
and she
said I'm
going to
call him
right away
and she
called this
man
who came
down
to see
me
he says
where do
you drink
and I
said
around
third
of
minutes
12
let's
go
and he
said
I
ran
into
people
Graves
a man
who
originally
came to
see
you
he said
how's
old
Evie
doing
this
guy
said
I
don't
know
Evie
but I
hear
he's
not
doing
at
all
so
he
said
Steve
told
me
that
you
didn't
have
a
chance
here
in
New
York
and we
don't
think
you
have
I
said
I
know
damn
well
I
haven't
been
licked
I
can't
throw
it
off
he
said
how
about
going
to
Texas
well
I
said
I
don't
know
about
that
well
he
expounded
on the
virtues
of
Texas
and the
good
old
American
ways
of
living
that
were
still
down
in
these
parts
of
the
country
he
gave
me
five
dollars
and bought
me
another
drink
and said
I'll
see
you
tomorrow
night
so
he
did
and
approved
the
performance
and of
course
I
worked
in
for
another
five
dollars
that's
for
sure
and
a
few
more
I
was
badly
needed
and
I
that
night
he
called
up
Oli
Lancaster
and
Dallas
and said
how
about
taking
this
guy
down
there
alright
he
said
send
me
out
you
son
of
a
bitch
of
Dallas
I
could
hear
Oli
booming
it
out
so
the
next
we
got
a
reservation
that
night
American
Airlines
the
Sunday
evening
and it
was the
Sunday
before
Labor
Day
September
6th
and the
dirty
soul
and soul
never
even
gave
me
a
drink
after
three
I
got
off
that
plane
and I
was the
first
person
out
of
it
and
I
had
enough
flying
for
one
night
and I
got
down
there
and I
looked
around
and I
saw
two
big
guys
and of
course
I was
having
hallucinations
all over
the place
and I
said
they're
either a
couple
of
demons
or a
couple
of
goons
from
some
gangster
squad
and then
I heard
that
booming
voice
again
there's
the
achy
bastard
there he
is
I've
seen
him
in
New
York
so
they
got a
hold of
him
and I
pulled
him
in a
car
and put
me
down
to
Texas
Clinic
and I
stayed
there
I guess
I stayed
there
all
together
about
two
three
months
but the
first
two
or three
weeks
it was
pretty
rugged
I didn't
dare go
out of
the place
one of
the girls
there that
was taking
care of
the books
and sort
of running
things took
me downtown
one day
and I
couldn't
get back
in that
place fast
enough
I was
scared of
the car
the traffic
I was
scared of
everything
and it
wasn't
I was
there two
weeks later
the guy
said I'm
going out
to mail
some letters
to the
airport
do you
want to
go out
and I
said I
sure do
I want
to see
this
airport
and see
if I'm
really
in
Dallas
when I
got out
then I
got out
of the
car and
I walked
up to
this
placard
it said
Love
Field
Dallas
Texas
I put
my hand
on it
and I
said alright
I'm in
Dallas
I believe
it
I stand
here I
did not
believe I
was in
Dallas
because
it's been
a pretty
rugged
and a
pretty
hot
summer
and I
haven't
had much
to eat
in those
three months
I was
thinking
everything
I could
lay my
hands
on
meant to
be cut
short
like that
furthermore
they gave
me a few
goofballs
on there
and I
hate those
things
anyway
I hate
the effect
of them
I just
like
these
I'm
sorry
that I've
taken up
so much
time
telling you
it's all
been on
myself
but I
didn't know
how to
bring the
history
of A.A.
and you've
all seen
how it
spread
how it
worked
I know
that if it
hadn't been
for A.A.
when I
got to
Texas
I never
would have
been able
to survive
and just
coming out
here alone
I'd have
been
lost
I'd have
lost
it was
tough enough
as it was
because I
was among
strange people
slightly
different ways
than ours
it was
enough evil
to get
from a
bowery
down here
in six
hours
and change
yourself
all around
but if it
hadn't been
for those
good Texas
people
and the
people in
the suburban
club
if I
hadn't been
able to
go around
there and
stay there
and shake
after two
weeks before
I went in
the club
it would
have been
a little
over two
weeks
I walked
by it
one day
and started
up the
sets
lost
my nerve
and went
back to
the clinic
almost like
a guy
going back
and hiding
under the
bed
and I
know
the trouble
times
they said
well I
heard him
talking
I don't
know what
we're going
to do
with this
guy
he's
gone
goofy
and then
I heard
a colored
girl that
worked
there
she's
quite an
old
woman
and she
said
don't
you
worry
about
that
man
you just
leave him
alone
and he's
sick
mentally
and physically
and gradually
I worked
out of it
nature
took over
and then
I was
able to
get around
the club
and get
into the
activities
and maybe
I got
in too
fast
that was
the hottest
summer
that had
been on
record
in the
Texas
Weather Bureau
I went
down on
the ranch
and I
was
working
the sheep
with this
man
and he
put me
in as a
shoot man
and that's
kind of
rugged
working
95 degree
day
and I
got mixed
up in
a
oil deal
and I
sold some
insurance
stock
and every
one of
them
flopped
insurance
company
did
almost
and I
was still
struggling
to get
back on
the street
and I
got in
another deal
and that
flopped
I was sober
a year
and one
month after
the year
was up
I flopped
and that
was in
October
1954
and that
13 months
and I
only had
a few
days
drinking
then
and
there was
over
a three
week
period
but I
got slapped
in the
county
jail
for ten
days
and that
was
Mr.
Bill
Becker's
emporium
and I
came out
and some
friends
took me
in their
house
and I
sobered
up
and I
haven't
had a
drink
since
in other
words
I've
had about
five years
of sobriety
in Texas
out of five
years and one
month I've
had five
years of
sobriety
total
and I
know
that I'm
grateful to
see the
graves
over
there
in Paris
and Charlie
for following
it up
and for
the people
in Texas
and over
here
all of
you people
who have
given me
another
chance
I
couldn't
have done
it by
myself
it isn't
under my
own
feeling
and I
know
that my
sobriety
in these
four years
these last
four years
that I've
been sober
it hasn't
been my
sole effort
that's kept
me sober
nor do I
believe it
has been
in
entirely the
friendship
and the
help of
people
I think
it was
then
the help
of a
higher
power
and while
I've lost
that idea
some
times
along
this way
of life
thank God
I got it
back again
because I
know that
I couldn't
exist without
it
there are
times when
I know
I'm not
like the
great many
people I
hear
talk
that
they say
there isn't
a
day in
their lives
that they
don't fight
the desire
to take a
drink
well I'm
telling you
right now
flat out
I'd go
get drunk
I couldn't
be that much
of a hero
to fight it
every day
and every
hour
I don't
have that
but I do
have
periods
every three
or four
months
when it's
maybe two
or three
days
that's all
I think
about
you've
taken a
drink
and if I
haven't
got myself
conditioned
to the
correct way
of thinking
and knowing
that if I
take that
drink
well I'm
going to
end up
I have
no doubt
that this
time I
know that
that last
drink
that the
liquor
knocked me
so badly
physically
and mentally
too that
I'd never
survive another
one
and I get
that in my
head and I
keep it there
and fight
for the fact
that I want
to go out
and I get
sick of this
being in
harness every
day and
going to
work
and I'm
getting along
in years
and I like
to have a
little rest
once in a
while but I
gotta go
to work
and I'm
and I often
think if I
come home
tonight if I
could take
one good
fudge of
whiskey or
one bottle
of
Valentine's
Ale and
go eat
it would
help me
a lot and
it probably
would help
me physically
and give
me a lift
but I
know I
can't do
it so
what is
the use
of time
or the
idea
I don't
quite get
so much
the idea
that I
used to
and I'd
like to
get drunk
although that
occurs once
in a while
because I
think in
every one
of us
there's
another
person
who's an
alter ego
and that
old drunk
that goes
every
batch
are still
in there
he may
be
dormant
but he's
there
just like
a volcano
he takes
his top
off and
he goes
zoom
or in
this time
he goes
zoom
boom
and I
haven't
got anything
much more
to say
except
stick to
your
A.A.
and stick
to God
and I
think that
you'll
find
the
if you're
having any
trouble
you'll find
help there
I want to
thank Dick
and I want
to thank
the other
members
and all
you people
who've
entertained
me
and I
sure have
enjoyed
coming to
Memphis
thank you
and Hal
and the
boys
are
passing
the remittance
basket
and
I want to
say again
if you happen
to go out
Texas way
where
Ebby has
been
and where
Ebby has
been the
last five
years
the A.A.
out there
is no
different
from the
A.A.
that you
have here
in Memphis
Tennessee
because my
first visit
to Memphis
was in
1935
when you
first organized
and you were
getting together
then
and one of
the great
pleasures of
A.A.
was to
walk in
and see
men and
women
right in
this audience
here tonight
who were
here
and
active
in
35
that are
here
and
active
tonight
everyone
that comes
in
A.A.
just
doesn't
walk
in
bless
themselves
and stay
sober
you have
a disease
called
alcoholism
and it's
a tough
one
some
people
are
lucky
I don't
know
I don't
know
who I
shot
whose
mother-in-law
or mine
that I
pushed
down
stairs
and I
don't
know
who I
shot
that gave
me the
right
I can
never
grasp
even
this
today
why
should
I
stay
sober
and
some
other
guy
didn't
he's
an
alcoholic
just
like
I
am
I
don't
know
what
it
is
I'm
not
going
to
try
to
answer
but
I
do
know
this
as
long
as
you
remember
yesterday
it's
a great
help
for
tomorrow
you're
quick
when
you
forgive
yourself
you're
quick
when
you're
going
to
get
well
but
when
you
forget
where
you
found
your
sobriety
how
you
got
sober
and
you
retire
of
the
country
club
and
no
longer
are
active
in
AA
you
are
no
longer
taking
your
medicine
and
if
you
don't
take
your
medicine
someday
down
the
road
oh
you
can
point
to
me
as
every
can
I
can
show
you
guys
that
are
sober
5
6
7
8
10
years
that
never
show
up
anymore
they're
not
dead
yet
I
know
a lot
of
people
with
different
diseases
that
have
arrested
them
you
can
arrest
your
alcoholism
and
maybe
you
can
stay
sober
if
you
never
come
back
to
AA
and
if
you
never
come
back
to
AA
I'm
one
that
will
never
miss
it
because
if
you're
ungrateful
as that
for
what
you
found
I
don't
think
me
personally
that
I
would
lose
it
and
I'm
only
speaking
for
myself
because
you
found
it
I
found
it
and
I
think
today
the
greatest
thought
that we
can
have
in
Alcoholics
Anonymous
not
for
you
who
are
so
lucky
that
are
here
tonight
and
all
over
the
world
in
AA
with
God
and
his
infinite
wisdom
gave
us
the
privilege
of
staying
sober
such
as
we
are
tonight
and
I
turn
my
back
on
the
guy
I
don't
deserve
to
buy
that's
merely
my
own
opinion
I
belong
to
the
greatest
fellowship
in
the
world
and
that
fellowship
is
called
Alcoholics
Anonymous
everything
I have
tonight
everything
I will
ever get
any other
night
from here
in
come
from
men
and
women
God
bless
you
just
like
you
may
I
always
be
with
you
and
may
someday
I
really
be
worthy
of
you
in
all
meetings
all
over
the
country
those
who
wish
to
join
us
we
close
by
saying
we
are
fathers
those
who
care
will
you
join
us
our
father
who
art
in
heaven
hallowed
be
thy
name
thy
kingdom
come
thy
will
be
done
on
earth
as
it is
in
heaven
give
us
this
day
our
daily
bread
and
forgive
us
our
trespass
as
we
forgive
those
who
trespass
against
us
and
lead
us
not
into
temptation
but
deliver
us
from
evil
the
line
of
the
sea
the
power
and
the
glory
forever
and ever
amen
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