Mother’s Day 1935: The Plant Was on the Table and Dr. Bob Was Under It – Mike F.

Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the workshop on early AA history. My name is Mike, and I'm an alcoholic. My sobriety date is April 23rd, 1985, and for that I'm grateful. And I want to thank you guys for having me. I appreciate the invitation. It's really nice to come to the East Coast. I live in Chandler, Arizona. I grew up in Buffalo, New York. You're going to hear a little bit about that tomorrow evening. Yeah, I love Arizona. You know, when Rob called me, we kind of talked about some workshop ideas, and I really wanted to talk about the traditions. And then I thought, well, maybe talking about AA history would be more appropriate for a setting like this. And there's a lot going on because AA history continues. We're making AA history while we're here tonight. And, you know, I grew up in an alcoholic home. I'm going to give you a little bit of background without going into my story because I don't want to have, you know, I don't want to overlap it tomorrow evening. But my dad was an alcoholic, and my dad's sponsor got sober in December 1946. And when the traditions were adopted, he was on stage in Cleveland during that time in 1950. So I grew up with Alcoholics Anonymous in my home. I grew up with AA history in my home. And tomorrow night I'll talk about, you know, the type of 12-step calls they did and things like that when I was growing up and the things that I was able to experience and be around. But when I got sober, they shipped me off to Texas because they didn't know what else to do. And down there I stayed with a friend of my dad's. His name was John C., Big John. And some of the old-timers would know John. John got sober October 28th in 1951. And John's best friend was a guy named Bill O. And Bill was a taper. Bill would go around the country. He was one of the pioneers in taping. And he spent his entire sober life recording, documenting AA history through the recordings. And Bill's sobriety date was October 21st, 1951. So I had these two gentlemen from Texas who knew Bill W. They knew Ebby. John used to go fishing with Ebby when Ebby lived in Texas. So John could share some of those stories with me. They dragged me all over and introduced me to everybody that they knew in my early 60s. And I got to know a lot of people who were in sobriety that were then long-time members of Alcoholics Anonymous. There was a guy named Roy Y. And Roy helped to start AA in Tampa, Florida. And Roy went on and helped to start AA in Houston, Texas. So I got to know guys like that. I got to meet guys that, you know, weren't pioneers, certainly, but guys like David A. from Dallas, who David became one of our trustees. And traveled extensively. So wonderful things with history. Some of my friends today, a few years ago, I had the privilege of writing a book with another sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous. And we did a book about, it was 20 sober men and women, each with over 50 years. So we had the privilege of talking and interviewing and spending time with these men and women with over 50 years sober so we could hear their stories and what they were going through. What their experiences were and what happened. My whole life of AA has, in some way, been gravitated toward the history. After I got married, I moved to Michigan. My wife and I were married in Chandler, Arizona, where I live. And I moved to Michigan with her for a few months while she was finishing up her teaching job. And after a meeting one day, these guys said, hey, Mike, we'd like to introduce you to someone. Would you come with us? And they brought me to this lady's house. And we went up these stairs. It was a little place on a lake. And it was a little condo. And we got inside. And the lady had her hair up. And she's wearing a long dress. And she looked like my grandmother, kind of my vision of how my grandmother looked years ago. And as we got to talking, she said, oh, my husband and I came into AA in Dr. Bob's house. And I'm like, huh? She said, yes, my husband was Ernie G. And he was AA number 78. And I said, oh. And I said, well, are you in AA? Because what she said was, we came into AA in Dr. Bob's house. And she said, no, I'm not. But when Ernie came in, they took us both like we both belonged. And I was as much a part of it. I was a part of it. I was a part of it. I was a part of it as he was. And that was how it was then. And they went to meetings of the Oxford Group in Akron at T. Henry and Clarice Williams' house. So Ruth had said to me when I was leaving that day, she said, come back any time you want. Because I made an appointment, a date, to come back the following Friday. And I went back every Friday that I could until I moved out of town. And what was really neat was Ruth would cut out my affirmations. And she would make these little crosses and things and give them to me. And I would go there, and she would talk about camping trips with Dr. Bob and Ann. And she would talk about some of the early members and their families and the things that they did. It was amazing to sit and listen. She would teach me and talk to me about the Oxford Group and the things that they were learning and the things that they were sharing then. And I was just thrilled. And then some years later, I was reading Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers. And I'm reading part of that. And it's like, wow, this really looks familiar. And I see that they're quoting Ruth. And I'm like, oh, that's a lady that I knew. Now, at no point did I ever say, I want to study AA history. I was not educated. I was not someone who wanted to become a historian. It just happened. My sponsor, John, was. It was sponsored by a guy named Dick Breen. And Dick was sponsored by Bill W. And John would take me around to functions like this. And he would have me drive. He'd say, oh, the kid's going to come with me. So he wouldn't have the committee pay airfare. They would give him reimbursement for his gas expense so he could take me with him. And we'd be driving up to Saskatchewan from Texas or Colorado or Phoenix or wherever. And John would be reading to me out of the Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers or Pass It On or AA Comes of Age. Or we'd be listening to recordings of Sam Shoemaker or some of the early AA members. And John would be quizzing me. What's Dr. Bob's address, kid? And it literally was AA School on Wheels. And it wasn't until many years later, I was talking to my friend Tom Eye, and I said, you know, I just don't know why I've had this drive toward the history. And Tom said something very important to my sobriety. And that was we tend to gravitate toward those things that were around us when we got sober and the services that we're involved in. Bill O, the man that I talked to you about, John's friend, had a tape library. He was out there. How Bill actually got started was he called. Yeah. Yeah. He called AA Foundation Office. It wasn't yet AAWS. And he had called the Foundation Office. And he asked for recordings of the first international convention. And they said they didn't have them. And he got angry. And he thought that they needed to have them, that it was important that we had documentation of the history of Alcoholics Anonymous. So he began recording. And not only did he begin recording, he began seeking out others who were doing this, even if they were only bringing in a small recorder, a little reel-to-reel or a wire recorder somewhere. And he was trading and getting these recordings. And then he would send them all over the place. I mean, I have more letters today in my library because I ended up with Bill in Arbutus's library a few years ago. He purchased it from the family after he had passed away. I don't know why I did that. I had no, that was not my goal. And my wife agreed to it. And I went down and I picked the library up and brought 3,500 reel-to-reel tapes back to my house and began to digitize those so that we could preserve the history and make those recordings available to future generations of AA, Al-Anon, and recovery people. And that's the service work that we threw ourselves into. And I do have a website where we're sharing that material today. And it's called recoveryspeakers.org. We're doing it in not a real massive way right now because we're setting up a foundation. It's going to be a research center for authors and historians, people that want to get information. So we're trying to put all that together right now and with the help of a bunch of AA guys. You know, that are just interested in the same things as I'm interested in. I've gotten a little deeper into some of this because now I'm doing some writing about it, which is a whole new deal for me, which has been fun. I mean, I really enjoy the opportunity. It's a privilege to be asked to do it. I just completed my fourth book in two years. And I didn't know my life was going in that direction, but it's all been related to AA history. What I wanted to do tonight, you know, many of us that have studied AA history have heard various versions of things. What I kind of wanted to talk about tonight was what that means as far as AA history. Because you can, you know, I was telling a couple of guys before the meeting that if I give my AA talk and you have my mother, who's got 47 years, and Al-Anon come up and give her version of my AA talk, you go, man, that's two different talk. That's, you know, those stories aren't the same. Well, it's just two different interpretations of the same story. And I think it's important when we look at history and we're looking at Alcoholics Anonymous and the history of our program and the roots of our program, we have to realize that it depends on the perspective of the person. Yeah. Yeah. That went through the history and what their version was of the history. For example, if I took a dollar bill right now and I held it between Mark and I, and I said, Mark, describe in detail what you see, Mark would describe one side of the dollar bill. Then I would describe the other side. And we'd have two completely different versions of the exact same thing. That's kind of what AA history is. And I want to start kind of my story tonight, not going back as far as the Oxford group and the Emanuel movement and the temperance movement. And, you know, there's been a lot of things that have happened way since the Washingtonians. And when we're studying AA history, these things come up. But, you know, in the three hours allotted to me tonight, I said to somebody earlier, I said, you know, somebody had said to this guy, how long do you speak? He said, well, I usually go an hour and a half. He said, well, that's great. Just turn the lights off when you leave. What I decided I would do is kind of just start with the messenger. And that really was Ebby. And Ebby was Bill's sponsor. Now, Ebby was born in Albany, New York. And he came from a well-to-do family. And Ebby's family would. It's summer in Manchester, Vermont. And Lois's family had a cottage there. And Bill would be there in the summers, not with Lois, with his family. And Ebby went to school at Byrne Burton for one year, which was an academy where Bill also went. And that's where he and Bill started spending some time together and got to know each other. Ebby only stayed for a year. And Ebby eventually ended up. Being expelled from school. And he went to work. That's when he started drinking. Now, both he and Bill, before they ever took a drink, according to Ebby, in one of the recordings that I have of Ebby, Ebby said that he and Bill both came from alcoholic families. And they both knew that they shouldn't drink. And they had discussed that before they ever took a drink. And then Ebby started drinking. And working. And his alcoholism progressed. And he had some little fights and scrapes and trouble. But nothing real bad. And this went on. It was a progressive illness for Ebby, like it is for most people. But then as Ebby got a little more mature and his disease progressed a little farther, his mother died first. And then his father died. And when his father died, he died. He inherited some money. And I don't have note cards or anything. But I'm thinking that was 1928 at the time. And Ebby was drinking pretty serious at the time. What he didn't lose in the stock market, as far as his inheritance, he drank up. And by 1933, Ebby had to ask his brother's permission if he could live in a room in the house that his parents had bought up there in Manchester. And there was no furniture. He had one room of furniture. And Ebby moved into the old house. And his brother allowed him to do that. Ebby, by then, had one funny incident. And a lot of you probably heard this. Because most people talk about AA history will talk about the funny little incidents. But Ebby had driven his car into a lady's kitchen, right through the house. And of course, the lady's freaking out. And Ebby opens the door and says, could I trouble you for a cup of coffee? Certainly, any alcoholic can identify with that type of behavior. I mean, Ebby had some pigeons that were bothering him. He was trying to paint the house. And the pigeons were a nuisance. So after a few drinks one night, it's raining. He goes outside. And he's going to shoot the pigeons. And while he's out there with a shotgun shooting the pigeon, he falls down. And he's laying on his back. And he figures, I'm not going to get up. And he keeps shooting. And the neighbors look out. And they see this. And of course, they call the law. Well, they had a thing in that area at the time that if you got in trouble with the law three times within a year, it was mandatory of six months in jail. So Ebby's next thing was drunken driving. And the law let Ebby go sneaked into one of our bathrooms. With a thinks RS-156. And that's where theую were out. And at that moment, this is what was happening. This was him on this couch in a utility room. And he was dozing off. And he was doing some Donald Trump-icated research on this predictions industry. So he got up in front of the judge. And he said, ilk this case's going to be out on browser today. And so he sat there in front of the judge. And he looked out of this case. And he then opened up. And then, you see this. It's nice. He's sitting. nurse that valentine ale over the weekend i can still be sober monday when i go back but then he's thinking well the judge told me uh to show up sober but what he really meant was not to drink what i failed to say was two months earlier not about six weeks earlier a couple of ebby's old friends came by to see him one's name was shep cornell and the other was a guy named zebra graves and they came by because they were heavy drinkers and they talked to ebby about the oxford group that they got involved in and they had stopped drinking and they came to carry that message to ebby and while ebby was painting the house he stayed sober and he bought into what they were saying they left him a book okay um and uh so ebby had bought into this and he was able to stay sober and he was able to stay sober and he was able to stay sober and he was able to stay sober. But when he wasn't busy, when the house painting was done, he started drinking again. Now he goes in front of the judge and this judge is Zebra's father. So here he is going in front of this guy. Monday morning, he gets back into the courtroom to appear before the judge. And this time, those two friends return and they're in the courtroom. But they bring with them another guy and this guy's name is Roland Hazard. And Roland had been sober. Roland's the guy that Bill talks about that was under the care of Carl Jung in Switzerland. And Carl Jung had said to Roland, you know, Roland had gotten sober for a period of time. Then he left him thinking that it was going to be fine. And shortly after that, he was drunk. And he went back and said, why do? And the doctor said, I've done everything I can. I don't know what to do for you. Sometimes some people get sober through a conversion experience, through a religious, a profound religious conversion. I've tried some of these things with you, Roland, but I don't know how to produce that. I can't help you. And he had given Roland a death sentence. And Roland left. And Sam Schumacher. Shoemaker, in one of the recordings I have, talks about Roland getting a book. And I believe the book was, I think Shoemaker said the book was For Sinners Only, which was one of the main books of the Oxford group. But I think he actually was wrong when he said that. I think the book was Varieties of Religious Experience because Shoemaker went on to talk about a story in that book that had touched Roland. And that story was the story of Samuel Hadley. Samuel Hadley got sober in 1880. And he went to the mission in New York, and it was the Water Street Mission. And he went in there, and there was kind of a revival. It was a mission. It was a soup kitchen. But you came in, and you gave your life to Christ. And these guys were getting sober. And there was a guy there named Jerry McCauley. And Jerry McCauley had the nickname of the, the Apostle to the Drunkard. And Samuel Hadley went in, and he gave his life to Jesus. And he got down on his knees, and he never picked up another drink. And if you want to read about his story, it's in Varieties of Religious Experience. But because of the time, I'm not going to go into his story. But I will tell you that when Roland found the mission of the Oxford group at Calvary, he went there, and the custodian, the manager at the time, was none other than Samuel Hadley's son, Harry Hadley. And you can imagine having a spiritual experience, and getting sober, and then going to this mission, and being greeted by the son of the guy who had been dead, who caused you to have your spiritual experience. And then when you look back through AA history, and you see the golden thread, the golden thread, it's amazing. So Ebi goes in front of the judge, and the judge says, I'm going to release you to Roland here. He had never met Roland. And his first weekend, Ebi got to speak five different times. They took him out, and they spoke at a town hall, and they were given testimony, and they were having these group meetings of the Oxford group. And Ebi was beginning to learn these principles. And then he ended up in New York. And while he's in New York, a few things happened, but in any case, he ended up living at the Oxford mission, the Oxford group mission, Calvary mission. And while he was there, he was taking the steps of the Oxford group. They didn't have steps like we have in Alcoholics Anonymous, but they had, you know, tenants that they were living by. They had the four absolutes. And they were living by these tenants. And one of them was that you make restitution to the people that you had harmed. And that you go out there, and you carry this message to others. And Ebi began to do that, and he found himself on Wall Street. And while he was down there, he heard about his friend Bill W. being in pretty bad shape. And he decided he was going to call on Bill. Now, here's where the story gets a little different. I'm going to give you Ebi's version of what happened. This is not the version you're going to read in the big book. Okay? Ebi said, he called over to the Wilson house, and Lois answered. And he told Lois that he was in New York, and he was sober. And it's the first time he had been there, sober. And Lois was happy. And he said, I got sober through the Oxford group. And Lois was very, very happy that Ebi was sober and calling. And Bill was in terrible shape. Bill had already been to the hospital earlier that year. Bill had tried to stay sober for a short period of time. And fell off. And Bill was in bad shape. Drinking himself to a certain death. And Ebi said, I'd like to come and call on Bill. I'd like to come and see Bill. And Lois, please. And she scheduled a dinner meeting. And she had Ebi come over. And on the day that he arrived, he got there early. He said he got there about 5 o'clock. And he was greeted at Clinton Street, where the Wilsons were living at the time, by a guy named Greens. And Greens was a driver. He was a driver for Lois' parents. They had some money. And Greens was a driver. Nobody else was home. And he let Ebi in. And Ebi waited. And not long after that, Bill showed up. And Bill had been drinking, Ebi said. But he wasn't too bad. And they had a little small talk. And Bill went out and had to get a loaf of bread or some ice cream. And Ebi knew that he was going for a drink. And a little while later, Bill had to leave again. Had to go get something else. Well, then Lois shows up. And she's gone. And she took out the... There was a girl that lived upstairs of their home on Clinton Street. So Lois was with her. So her, Ebi, Bill, and the girl from upstairs had dinner together. And then they went up into the parlor. And this is Ebi speaking now, okay? And Ebi says, you know, we had some small talk. And then it was Ebi's turn to tell his story. And he spent several hours talking about how the guys came to him and the principals of the Oxford group and where his drinking, had led him, and the hopeless condition that he was in. And he said, you know, they taught me that I had to find a God of my understanding. Okay? Of my own understanding. And, of course, Bill's listening to this. And then Bill agreed to walk Ebi to the subway. And Ebi said that he knew that Bill was not doing this because he wanted to go have a drink. Because he had a bottle in the house. And he said, on the way to the subway, Bill put his arm around Ebi. And he said, I don't know. I don't know what you got, kid. But I want it. Now, that's Ebi's version of the kitchen table. Again, take that dollar bill. Whose version? You know, I don't think we need to rewrite history. We need to just experience it and learn about it. Now, Bill was drunk and Ebi was sober. You know, a couple of days later, Bill showed up at the mission. And he had a guy with him, Alex. And they had both been drinking. And, you know, they did meetings similar to this. They had a little podium up there. And you'd get up and you'd give your pitch. And, you know, people would, again, they'd give their life to Christ. And Bill's there at the mission. And it's kind of a call up. And he starts walking up. He wants to talk. And some of the, you know, the bleeding deacons are trying to hold him back. They want this guy to go up. And Ebi said, oh, let him go. Well, let's hear what he's got to say. And Bill went up. And I could just see it now, man. You know, Bill's leaning against the piano, smoking a cigarette. And he talks. Now, nobody knows what he talked about. Ebi never really reported that. But what Ebi said was that he knew that his calling on Bill had deeply affected Bill. That, to me, was amazing. The next day, Bill shows up at Towns Hospital, where he had already been several times, waving a bottle of beer. And he sees his doctor. And he says, Dr. Silkworth, this time I've got it. And Dr. Silkworth and Bill often said, would one day become a saint within Alcoholics Anonymous. And Silkworth said to him, I can see that. Now go on up and sleep it off. You know, it's interesting. And that later, when Bill talked, he talked about Ebi coming and visiting him again in the hospital and bringing him the book, Varieties of Religious Experience. And Bill said he read that book and he devoured that book. He said it's kind of a tough read. And I don't know if any of you have tried, but it is. But again, there was some, that had an effect on Bill because he started to see some things. Because he was. He was reading that book. And what he was seeing is the people who were getting better, the people who had these conversion experiences, had first had major calamity before that. And here Ebi comes to call on him. And Bill says, tell me again what this simple formula is, Ebi, that you guys are doing. And I may screw it up because I don't have my notes here. And I can't remember everything. But, you know. Ebi said, complete deflation. Bill, you've got to admit that you're licked. You've got to admit that you're licked. Complete deflation at depth. You have to have some belief in a God, in a power greater than yourself. In some God of your understanding. Bill didn't like that part, but he could see it in Ebi. You have to list the people that you were harmed and be willing to, pay restitution to them. You have to be able to have a confession. So you had confession and restitution and deflation. You had working with others. You had to pray to a God, whatever God it was, even if you were doing it only as an experiment. And he said, Ebi left. And later when Bill talked about it, the key that Bill talked about was that Ebi was prudent. That he had this spiritual quality. About him, this prudence. That he wasn't someone who was just talking a story. He was living it. This guy should have been out getting a job. And yet at 10 o'clock in the morning, he's by the side of the bed. Carrying the message to Bill. That had a profound impact on Wilson. And when Ebi left, Bill cried out. Because he'd sunk into a depression. And Bill was prone for that. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, Ebi left. And he said, this was one of the deepest and darkest depressions he had had. And in the pit of that depression, he cried out, if there is a God, show himself. And Bill talks about the room lighting up. And the breeze of the Spirit coming through. And he could feel the Spirit. And he knew this was the God of the preachers. He knew this was the God that he grew up learning about. That he had long since rejected. Because he had a scientific education. And he believed that man was God. Have I gone too long or something? Okay. Just let me know when I have. And Bill had this spiritual experience in the hospital. And he talks about it in Big Book. You know, and he talks about, there must be thousands of others like me that need this message. I mean, think about that. Here this guy has just had a spiritual experience. And immediately he's thinking about thousands of people. Thousands of other people that must also need this. And at some point, he talks to the doctor. And he says, can I start talking to others that are here in this hospital? And to my knowledge, he was the first one given permission as a lay therapist to talk to alcoholics in the hospital setting. Prior to that, it was medical people were doing that. Religious people were doing that. But Bill was a lay. Alcoholic. And they gave him permission. And he starts talking to these people. What does he do? He starts the first halfway house. He opens up Clinton Street to the drunks. Lois is cooking them meals. Lois is going to work at a department store. Bill's unemployable. He's new in recovery. He's excited. He's had this amazing spiritual experience. He's got an opportunity to work with the drunks from the hospital. He goes and he pulls a few out of alleys and some off of bar stools. And some from the Oxford group. And he starts meetings in his house. And he's talking to these guys. And he's carrying a message to them that he's not even sure what it is. And he's preaching to them. Telling them that they've got to do this. And they can have this hot flash, this spiritual experience and get well like him. Six months pass. And not one was sober. I do want you to know that Ebby was sober. Ebby had stayed sober. For over two years. For 29 months. From that time. But Lois' family starts looking at Bill. And they're wondering when's this dude going to get a job. You know. I mean he's trying to save all these drunks. But come on. We've been supporting him long enough. What's he going to do? He needs to get a job. So Bill finds himself in a little deal. Which lands him in Akron of all places. And he's down in Akron with really no money. He's staying in a Mayflower hotel. And he's trying to put this deal together. And it falls apart. Now it hadn't really fallen apart. But he didn't know that it hadn't really completely fallen apart. But it had fallen apart. And they left. The guys that he was in the proxy row with had taken off. And Bill was left by himself. And we've all heard the story of what happened. He's pacing the lobby of the Mayflower hotel. And at one end of the lobby there's a bar. And at the other end of the lobby there's a church directory. And he says the bar's starting to fill up. And he can hear the noise. And he's thinking, well, maybe I ought to go in and have a couple ginger ales and strike up a conversation and spend a little bit of time. The other end of the lobby is a church directory. He's more interested in the bar than the church directory. Who wouldn't be? His friends just left. The business failed. He doesn't have enough money to get home. And something said to him, Bill, Bill, all those people that you helped, in New York, that you tried to help, maybe none of them stayed sober, but you did. And he realized for the first time in that six months, he was going to get drunk. And he said that was the first time. And I believe it was the only time in Bill's life he was going to get drunk. And he sees a name on that directory, Walter Tunks. I've heard various stories as to why he picked Walter Tunks. But it's interesting because Walter Tunks was associated with some of the folks from the Oxford group. And he called them up and he said, hey, I'm a drunk from New York and I need a drunk to work on. And I need some Oxford group people because maybe they can direct me in. And he gave them the name of a guy named Norman Shepard. And he called Norman. And Norman said, Bill, I'm kind of busy, but I can give you a list of names. And he gave him a list of around 10 names of Oxford group people that he could call that might be able to help him. And Bill started calling down. And he got on that list. Of course, it was Mother's Day weekend, 1935. He went through the list and he said, you know, this one's going out of town. This one's got a sore toe. This one's on their way to church. You know, different things are going on. Finally gets to that last name and he recognizes the name. It's Henrietta Cyberling. And he recognizes the name. And he's probably a little bit apprehensive because his Cyberling name was a pretty big name in Akron. And he wasn't going to call her. And he went up to his room and he went back down. Finally, he just knew he had to call her and he called. And Henrietta talked to him and said, well, I do know someone. Why don't you come right out here, Bill? And Bill does. He goes out to the gatehouse. And he has dinner with Henrietta. And she calls over to her friend, Ann Smith, Dr. Bob's wife. And she says, I've got a guy here from New York that Dr. Bob needs to meet. I think he might have an answer. And Ann says, I'm sorry. You know, it's Mother's Day. It was the day before Mother's Day. And Dr. Bob brought me home a plant. And the plant's on the table and he's under it. And we can't go anywhere. And Henrietta persisted and got Ann to agree to bring Dr. Bob the next day and arrange for Bill and Dr. Bob to meet on Mother's Day, May 12, 1935. And they met in the living room of the Cyberling estate. Actually, in the library in Akron, Ohio. And Bill and Bob went off into that room by themselves. Now, on the way over, Smitty, who I got to know while I was in Texas, said that on the way over, his dad says, I'll give this bird 15 minutes and we're leaving. He was nursing a pretty bad hangover. And they went into that room. And Dr. Bob says, it must have been about 5 o'clock. And they stayed till about 11.30. Dr. Bob said that he had been attending meetings of the Oxford group for a couple of years and he knew the formula. He knew what they were talking about. And he understood these principles. And he had tried to apply these to himself and he had tried to get sober, but he was... Dr. Bob said he kept getting tight every night. What Bill brought to Bob was the power, I believe, of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that was that it was one alcoholic talking to another alcoholic. He was able to share his experience, what happened to him in a general way. And I have a feeling in five and a half hours and from the many recordings I've listened to of Bill, he was a little bit more than general. But he had... But he had... But he had... He had cut through every obstacle that Dr. Bob had. And Dr. Bob could identify with him as another alcoholic. And in that identification, in that surrender, he was able to find hope. You know, Dr. Bob's the first one that had a slip. He went down to Atlantic City on a medical conference and got drunk. And he came back and Bill and Ann rounded him up and sobered him up the best they could. He had to perform a surgery. He was able to successfully do that. And on that day, he had his last drink of alcohol. And AA has recognized that as the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous. And we use the date, Alcoholics Anonymous recognized the date as June the 10th, 1935. Now, we know historically that that date's not accurate. It's likely that the actual date was June 17th because the medical conference ran starting June 10th. So it's unlikely that that June 10th is the official date. But nevertheless, it wasn't like they were going around thinking they were making history. You know, they were trying to survive. They were trying to get sober. And as a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous, I sometimes get concerned when I hear people say, we need to do it like they did it back in the good old days when AA really worked. And they started throwing percentages of 90% of the people got sober and stuff. And from all of the information, everything that I've been able to learn, and I've spent the better part of 20 years studying AA history and listening to literally hundreds of recordings, I have not seen that evidence. I don't see it. Because they went out and started working with people. They worked with a doctor. He didn't make it. They worked with another guy. And Smitty used to love to tell this story that the first guy that Dr. Bob and Bill worked with was a guy named Eddie. You'll probably hear this story again tomorrow night. But Eddie was a crazy drunk and he would climb out the window and he'd go escape and he'd go get drunk and Dr. Bob and Bill would round Eddie up and bring him back and try to get him sober. And Eddie was out there. And one afternoon he was chasing Ann Smith around the house with a butcher knife. And they had to have Eddie committed. So the first guy that Dr. Bob and Bill tried to help was a failure. I don't know what else you can call it. It was a failure. It didn't work. He got drunk. He had to be hospitalized. But did Dr. Bob and Bill stop? No. No. They went on and they carried the message to the next suffering alcoholic. They did that because their sobriety depended upon that. That willingness to carry the message to work with the next alcoholic was what was going to keep them sober. They had to do that. Now I will tell you interesting, Eddie, the guy that they tried, the butcher knife dude, Smithy said 15 years later, Dr. Bob's funeral, Eddie came up and extended his hand and said, do you know who I am? And Smithy said, why you're Eddie? And he said, yes, and I've been sober for over two years. I'm a member of the Youngstown group. Now I've done a little study and Eddie actually stayed sober the rest of his life and worked for the Area Council on Alcoholism there in Youngstown, was an active AA member, participated in AA just like that. Just like any of us and was just a wonderful guy. So Eddie wasn't a failure. Eddie was a success. The seed was planted. It just took a while before it grew. Eddie in one of his letters to Bill said that he was actually there the day he was with Dr. Bob and Bill when they called on Bill D, AA number three. I haven't found that anywhere else in AA history, but it's recorded. It's in a letter to Bill W. and there is a copy of that letter in the World Service Archives. And it's Eddie saying, I was there. And he also said that the case of the butcher knife was overstated. Yeah, again, another version. But you know, nevertheless, they went and they saw Bill D, AA number three, the Akron attorney and Bill picked up his bed, picked up his clothes and walked out a free man. And spent the rest of his life a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous until his death in 1954. His wife Henrietta was very instrumental in helping to get the family group movement going. They weren't, they didn't call themselves Al-Anon until many years later. But her and Ann Smith started meetings in 1936 of the wives in Akron and the families. And they began having these meetings and beginning to see that they needed a program for themselves. And it wasn't just making coffee and supporting their family. Those were the types of things that my friend Ruth was able to participate in. Those are the experiences that I hope we never lose because I remember growing up and coming home from school and there'd be a drunk sitting there waiting for dinner because my mom was fixing dinner, waiting so that my dad and his sponsor could take the drunk to the meeting that night. See, those are the experiences that I've been able to have in my own home where we bring people in not to live with us because we have children. We haven't been in a position to do that. But certainly we've had them in our home in all stages of sobriety. And every member of my family has been exposed to alcoholism at every stage. And I'm grateful to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that they understand that this is a program of recovery and it's family recovery. It's not just the alcoholic gets well. Well, Bill, and Dr. Bob, and Bill D start working on drunks. They start trying to carry the message. They're going to meetings of the Oxford group. They still didn't have a name for AA. And they find one here and they find one there. And Bill goes back to New York and he finds a couple and they get together and they get a little group going in New York. They already had the little group going in Akron and both kind of are going a little bit and one falls out and they freak out. Every time somebody would have a slip, every time somebody would get drunk, they'd wait for the next one. And it was it was hard. And I mean, I've listened to talks of Clarence and these guys and Clarence said that Clarence S. from Cleveland, he said he worked with 100 drunks before he got one to stay sober. They were pulling drunks off of bar stools and out of alleys and out of courtrooms and they were trying to get them sober and most of them weren't making it. They worked on tons of drunks before they got one. Do we want to go back to those? There's more opportunities for sobriety today and sponsorship and sponsorship and good AA and meetings all over this world today. I never want to see those days that those guys pioneered and went through to pave the way so that we could have the opportunities for sobriety that we have today. Alcoholics Anonymous today is a wonderful program and as a result of it there are all kinds of other programs out there using the 12 steps that started right here in AA. It was about 1937, I think it was in October. Bill and Dr. Bob had some cute communications and Bill ended up bringing a few guys and they went over to Dr. Bob's house and they talked and they counted heads. They wanted to see how many people were sober and for how long. Now you had 1935, 1936 and 10 months, almost 10 months of 1937. These guys literally were out there on a mission to get people sober. They had to do this for their own sobriety. They counted 40. 40. I know people who sponsor 40 people in a year. Now. Okay? 40. Times were difficult for them. Most of those people were low bottom, skid row. Most of them were really down and outers. Most of them were last gaspers as Bill liked to call it. That day, they met. They counted heads and later that night, they talked to the group there in Akron and they made a decision that they would, that they needed to have a book because they needed to carry this message to people in distant lands. Okay? Like neighboring cities. They needed something. They had nothing. So the decision was made to write a book. But they knew to write a book, they needed some dough. So they gave Bill that assignment. Bill had a little, sales experience. Okay? So Bill's given that assignment. But the other thing is, is they knew they were going to have to have missionaries. They didn't yet see the fellowship as it is today. Okay? What they saw was they needed to have paid missionaries. That was, if you got sober, okay, you'd have to quit your job and you could go out to the west coast and you could help them start groups out there and it'd probably take you a year so they would pay you for this. And so they had this idea of the, paid missionaries. And they thought about the idea of maybe having a chain of hospitals where they could, you know, take care of the drunks. Kind of like what Dr. Bob had begun doing there in Akron and what was going on in Towns Hospital and Bill's involvement. So, of course, Bill goes, Bill gets the assignment to do that and Dr. Bob is going to investigate the hospital thing and, you know, the paid missionaries was, you know, kind of dependent on, you know, we'll talk about that later. Let's see how the money is. And so Bill goes back and he starts writing a book and by the, I'm just looking at my clock here. I can see people yawning. I know it's late. This is when they put me on. Believe me, I'm on west coast time. I got up like three hours earlier than you guys. I was up at four o'clock west coast time. But I had 94 cups of coffee. I'm, you know, I don't know. I'm up for a while. But anyway, by late spring, early summer of 38, Bill had written three chapters of the book and he took it to Harper's and they write it over and they said, we like this book, man. You know, can you write more like this? Can you continue this? And he said, oh, well, I think so. So they offered him 1,500 bucks. It's in 1930. 1838. When you can't pay your mortgage. And then Bill was broke. It wasn't working. He was broke. He had no money. He was about to lose his house. Ended up losing his house. Turned down Harper because his buddy Hank P. Yeah, that's another thing. You know, you hear, you'll hear all kinds of stuff. You know, I know Smitty, Dr. Bob's son. He used to talk a lot and he would say things like, if it was up to my dad referring to Dr. Bob's son, he would say, if it was up to Dr. Bob, AA would have never left Akron. And if it was up to Bill, he would have franchised it. And then everybody would laugh. Really? The truth is that that statement's not true. If it was up to Bill to franchise it, he could have and he didn't. And through Dr. Bob, AA grew. Dr. Bob was a prince of the 12 steps. Dr. Bob brought people into his home. They got sober. They lived with him and Ann. They went on and they started AA in Cleveland. They started AA in Detroit. They started AA in Chicago. And AA moved west and AA moved south as a result of Dr. Bob and what Dr. Bob did. Bill was in Charlie Towns Hospital and Charlie calls him into the office one day and says, Bill, I want to talk to you. And Bill's like, well, what about? And he says, I'd like to offer you a job. I'd like to offer you a part ownership of this hospital. I'd like to give you an office. I'd like to see you begin to work with the alcoholics here and bring your guys in and do it here. Someday, your organization's going to fill Madison Square Garden. This is a hospital administrator saying to a drunk that's got 40 drunks in the world sober, someday your deal's going to fill Madison Square Garden. I think that man was a visionary. And he offered Bill a piece of the hospital and a drawing account and an excellent opportunity. And Bill said he's riding home that day and he hears, you know, he's going through his mind and he's thinking, wow, I could get Lois out of the department store. Wow, maybe we could pay our mortgage. Hey, this is a good thing. Then he gets this little thing from the Bible and it's the laborer is worthy of their hire. And he's like, yes, I can do this. And he goes, and he goes home and he shares the exciting news with Lois. And Lois is not nearly as excited as he is. But she supports it. Later that night they had a meeting there in their home on Clinton Street and Bill shares it with the other alcoholics. And he said they were a little on edge and one of them finally spoke up and said, Bill, you can't do this to us. You can't do this to us. That'll make us professionals, Bill. No, we can't be professional. We can't do it that way. Aren't you the same guy who often says that the good is sometimes the enemy of the best? And Bill listened. And Bill said that there was our second tradition. That it was the group conscience that spoke. It was the God through that group conscience that said, no, you can't do that. Now, I do believe that Bill later documented that story so that we could see it. And when he did that, he shifted the credit off himself of making that decision and gave it to the group. And Bill did that over and over throughout his life. Bill was a great one for lifting people up and giving Dr. Bob the credit for being a spiritual one. And what happens as a result of that is later after Bill is gone, did you give me like a time out? Okay. People later start saying, you know, that Bill was atheist. That Bill was, you know, this way. Well, it's just not the case. Bill had a profound spiritual experience in Towns Hospital. Bill never wavered. Yes, Bill knew that AA had to be all-inclusive and never exclusive. Bill knew that no matter where you were coming from, what you believed in or didn't believe in, what color you were, what sex you were, what drugs you took, what other problems you had, Bill understood all of it. And he said, we need to be all-inclusive, never exclusive, provided you meet one qualification and one only, and that is that you have an alcoholic problem and a desire to stop drinking, period. None of the other things mattered. That's why Alcoholics Anonymous has two million members today. That's why NA is growing and CA is growing. That's why these people and Hills Anonymous and all these other organizations are doing well today because Wilson wanted them to. He wanted us to have our traditions so that we could protect AA for the future. I know I'm not talking much about history here. And I can get a little opinionated. And I mean, we all have the right to do that and for the benefit of the newer people. I am not an authority. Okay? I mean, anything I shared tonight is my own authority. It's my opinion. It's my opinion of how I interpret this program. My opinion of my understanding of the program. That may change some tomorrow. Okay? But as of now, it's just my opinion. And I am no different than anybody in this room. None. I'm one drink away from a drunk. I got drunk and we get sober. And that's the deal, man. Okay? Nobody. I mean, you hear these guys, you think they wrote the book, you know. And this is not a workshop. This is not a workshop to be instructional. Because I don't think AA is an instructional program. I think AA is a program of shared experience. And we need a lot more shared experience and a whole lot less instruction. And I think we're all going to survive all of this. I do have some concerns. I want to share one and then I seriously would like to open it up for any questions that you might have. And that is this. 1946, the traditions were published in the great line for the first time. He actually started rolling them out in August. But they printed an article, the 12 points of tradition in April. Then he wrote a pamphlet and they took the long form of the traditions and some writing of Bill and they put it together and it was AA tradition. They published it in 1947 and they sent it out to the groups so that the groups would start to get familiar with the traditions. And they did that because they wanted the traditions to become part of Alcoholics Anonymous. And they were a couple of people who were kind of objected to the traditions and the form that they were in and they talked to Bill. One was the founder of AA in Chicago, Earl T. And they met and they talked about it and Dr. Bob had his input and the bottom line was that they decided to rewrite the traditions in a condensed form and they came up with the traditions that were adopted in Cleveland in 1950 and those are the same traditions that we use today. In 1952, Bill started writing a book called The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. And he did the steps because he wanted to enlarge and broaden on the steps because he had 15 years of experience with the steps and got to see 15 years of experience of other members. And he also wanted to communicate a message about the traditions to the fellowship. Since April 1953 when that book was first published by AA Publishing, now by AA World, there has not been another book on the traditions written. There has been several pamphlets and the Grapevine has done some articles but other than that, nothing. I have talked with many people long term sobriety and I have asked them in their opinion what the most important part of Alcoholics Anonymous is. And every one of them have said to me that the traditions and the traditions that we use in our lives are the most important part of Alcoholics Anonymous is. And every one of them are the glue that hold our fellowship together. I go to a lot of meetings all over and I can tell you I could do it right here. I could pull three people out and ask you to just tell me four traditions and chances are you wouldn't be able to do it. If these are the glue that hold us together we, in my opinion, need to do a more effective job of helping people to understand what they are. And I think the way to do that is to make history fun. Because see the steps were the experience of the first few members and the traditions are the experiences of the first group. And if we help people understand our history they're going to get excited about the traditions. And you know when we have a tradition meeting at my home group I'm excited. Because traditions are cool. You know it really is. There's some fun stories that go with it but it helps us to understand. So I think that that's critical and I pray that as I go out and we do and we share with the people that we sponsor and the people that they sponsor that we'll get some of the literature that is available the 12 and 12 and AA Comes of Age and pass it on. And we'll talk to these folks about the traditions and we'll talk to our home groups and we'll begin to see how the traditions will grow. And I believe if we do that the glue that has held Alcoholics Anonymous together for 77 years will continue to hold it together for just so long as God needs it. And for that I'm grateful. I want to thank you for having me tonight. I know I've talked fast because I you know how do you cover AA history you know in an hour. I would like to open it up if anybody has any questions to take them. What I'll do if you share your question I'll repeat it so that they can have it on the recording and then I'll see if I have an answer and if I don't I'll make one up. Anybody have any questions? Any comments? Yes. I don't. The question is regarding Tradition 11 and you know is there a conference action to enlarge upon Tradition 11 so that it would include the internet and all forms of media. I think common sense okay tells us that in respect to the spiritual foundation of our fellowship that we should guard anonymity at every cost. Now individually I mean if you want to go on Facebook okay as long you know in keeping with the Tradition as long as you're not saying you know I'm Mike and my last name and I'm a member of Alcoholics Anonymous okay you're okay with that okay in the letter I think we need to be careful because we have to watch the egos and you know Bill talked about that when we have enough deflation at depth okay for the individual then we allow room for the grace of God and I believe that when we have enough deflation at depth as a society as a culture within a culture as a fellowship we allow the room for the grace of God that's my opinion on that any other questions alright you know the questions regarding the you know the background of what was used when the big book was being written and you know was it all Christianity is that pretty much okay you know Dr. Bob said that they used the Book of James okay the Sermon on the Mount and the 13th Corinthians okay there is no question that the Oxford group was a non-denominational evangelical movement okay that was soliciting building life changers through Christian principles okay the principles that Dr. Bob and Bill used that were getting them sober were those principles okay as the book was being written okay Bill said half of our current membership were once of this temperament okay so they weren't all Christians coming into AA and then he went on and did a chapter to the agnostics and then when he did traditions he said we need to be all inclusive never exclusive and I've got recordings where Bill talks about groups that had decided to change the steps and take the word God out the Buddhist group okay and replace it with good Bill said we need to be all inclusive never exclusive Bill said that you can take some of our any two or three alcoholics gathered together for the purpose of sobriety can take all of some of or none of our program and still call themselves a group I don't know if that answers your question okay but you know the reality is yes they were heavily influenced through the Christian principle and we see that and in our culture okay you know Christianity you know you know others are growing now and and even strong movements that are you know agnostic and atheists today are growing and scientific movements I think Bill Bill had the foresight to see this I don't think that anything that's going on today in AA is new it's already happened and that these things you know come again I do think that that as a group conscience you know each group is autonomous okay each group can make the decisions for that group it does say unless that affects a neighboring group or AA as a whole so we have to be respectful of the other groups and I think that that's that's the code is really to be respectful again my opinion I'm not speaking for AA yep yep well you know as a historian what I'm looking for is historically accurate information his question is regarding a book by Susan C okay and in that book she makes claims okay one of the claims is that Bill demanded whiskey on his deathbed okay another claim she makes is that Bill was a sex addict okay other claims that have been made is that Bill was a womanizer other claims have been that he had multiple affections okay I will address those quickly okay one it is documented okay that when Bill was in the dying days of his life in and out of consciousness most likely on very heavy medication okay gasping dying of emphysema asked for a drink of alcohol several times it's documented okay do I think it's something Needs to be out in the public? No. I mean, I, if you haven't been able to tell, I mean, I have a lot of admiration and reverence for our founders and the people that made this program. Historically, that is accurate. But I think that she puts it in the wrong context. I think she's doing it to sell books. Sex addict. Bill was, whether we, you know, I mean, the reality is that he became a public figure. I mean, Time Magazine wanted him on the cover. He turned down, you know, three different opportunities to have doctoral degrees. So Bill was recognized as a public figure. They had AA conferences that he would speak at and international conventions he would speak at multiple times during the conventions. And these were open meetings in media, newspapers, would go to this, okay? These journalists would go in from the tabloids and they would go into these things and do you think some young reporter would have loved to break the big story on the leader of this cult, okay? Because some of them were saying that AA is a cult. Nowhere in the hundreds of magazine articles written from 1939 until Bill's death in 1971 was there, ever one word printed about that man's character that wasn't good, not one. Now, when I think about that, I think, wait a minute, if he was a sex addict and they had to like hire guards to protect the vulnerable young women from him, would that not have made one of these trashy newspapers? I mean, I've got some girly magazines with AA articles in them, okay? Great articles, 12-step articles and things. I don't believe that it's true, okay? I don't see any evidence of that. Lois, his wife, journaled everything, okay? She wrote letters, hundreds of letters to her friends. She did books. She had interviews. And she's got diaries. Not one word in any documentation that Lois ever wrote did she talk about Bill being unfaithful to her, any infidelity, any womanizing, any seriousness. Serious marital problems, okay? Certainly, they had their times, their difficulties. You don't hear these prophets of doom mentioning the fact that from 1950 until 1971 when Bill died, Lois and him traveled 40 times together, 40 different trips over those years, and a half a dozen or so of those were out of the country for weeks at a time. They don't talk about the love letters that they exchanged between each other. They're all... They're all at stepping stones. Any one of us can go see them. They act like this guy was a sex addict that was, you know, on the verge of divorce and mean to his wife and didn't live by the principles. Bill lived by the principles of this program as well as anybody. Now, you know, was he a saint? No. No. I mean, I've seen letters, you know, confidential letters to him and his doctors where he shares some of the things that he was going through and some of the difficulties. He suffered. He suffered terribly with depression, okay? You know, they'll make a big deal out of it. You know, he did LSD. Well, if you understand what the whole LSD experiments were at the time that he was doing them, they weren't illegal. It wasn't illegal, okay? They were doing research. They were trying. Then he went from that into vitamin B3, niacin, okay? And he spent years on niacin. He wrote what came out to be three books on niacin and made talks to the medical professionals about the effects of niacin on the alcoholic schizophrenics. He worked with two noted doctors up in Saskatchewan on the niacin project. One of the people from New York that he worked very closely with is a lady named Helen W., okay? And Helen and Bill became very close. They spent a lot of time together. Helen typed up the manuscripts that became those transcriptions of what Bill sent out on the niacin, okay? It is common knowledge that they were close. Helen was there when Bill was dying, okay? Now they say that he had a long-lasting love affair with Helen. Now, I believe that it was a loving relationship. I believe that. I believe it lasted 15 years. There's evidence of that. I believe they were very close. What they point to as a smoking gun is they say Bill left her money in the will. Well, he did. I've seen his will. He left her money in the will. Well, I believe he left her money in the will. Maybe. I think that it's a theory. He left her money in the will so that she could continue to do the research that they had been doing for 15 years. Other people say it's because they were having a love affair. You know, did he have sex with her? Did he not? I have no idea. I don't know. I can tell you this. He wasn't a woman. He wasn't a womanizer. He wasn't a sex maniac and he didn't have multiple affairs. Is it possible that he and Helen were in love and had a relationship, an affair? I think it's possible. I think there's some people out there that are hell-bent on convincing us that it happened. I'm just not so sure I want to buy into that. And again, you know, are my opinions biased? Of course they are. I mean, if I was writing a book or doing a movie on Bill W., you know, he would say, you know, he would reach down from the heavens and pick the next drunkard up and bring him to the top of the mountain and the light would go on and the spirit of the universe would come shining through him and everybody would get well from alcoholism, but they didn't ask me to do that. So, you know, I love our co-founder. I mean, I just finished a book about him. So, that's just important stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I'll briefly, the story of Ebi. Ebi was sober during, you know, he lived with Bill while the foundation of the big book was actually, you know, being written. And we don't hear a talk about that, but I think Ebi actually was a contributor to what we get sober on today more than just carrying the message to Bill. Because, I mean, how many nights he and Bill sat up until two, three o'clock in the morning smoking, chain smoking, drinking coffee, talking about the guys that they were helping out with. And I think that's a great story. Helping and stuff. So, I think Ebi had an impact. Ebi got drunk. He got drunk. He came back into the program several times. Bounced around for a while. In 1953, they rounded him up. They paid his way to Texas. They made arrangements for him to go there. He went down to Texas. He got sober. Stayed sober for the longest period of time that he had. Sometime into the early 60s. Okay. I think late, maybe 1960s. 1960, early 61. I don't have the dates. He was dating a woman there. She died. He got drunk the next day. Had some problems. Ended up back in New York. Bounced around a little bit. Lived with the Wilsons again. And then his health turned bad. They brought him to Ballston Spa, New York, where he stayed with a couple named Mickey and Margaret McPike. And he lived there for the last two and a half years of his life. And he died sober and was sober for that. That's the rest of the story. Thanks, guys. God bless you.