The Difference Between a Periodic and a Chronic Drunk – Clarence S.

Thank you. Can you hear back there? I don't want you to miss anything. I am Clarence Snyder, and I live in Castleberry, Florida. Before I do anything, I want you to meet my wife, Amazing Grace. She is amazing. She's a rummy also, but she's one of those periodics. There's a big difference between a periodic and a chronic. I am a chronic, I'm always drunk. She's the periodic, she's the one of these people that causes all the trouble in AA. You know, you never know what they're going to do. The periodic, he goes to work, gets sobered up, gets himself a new home, a new wife, new family, money in the bank, Two new cars, belongs to a couple of clubs. Then he gets drunk and all that goes down the drain. And what kills me about him is this. He gets back on a beam again. He gets a new life, new home, new job, and always gets a better job than he had before. This is what gets me. And he goes on and on in that manner the rest of his life. They are the undependable people. they should be barred from the universe. Me, I'm steady and I'm dependable. So that's a vast difference between the periodic and the chronic. Well now, they tell me that when you come to any meeting you're supposed to talk about how it was, what happened, and how it is. I promise I will not delude you with a drunk-a-log. I think I see no point in it. However, I'll tell you where I came from. I was living in Cleveland, Ohio and I was married to a nice gal by the name of Dorothy and I became quite successful in the banking and finance business to the point that the company I was with transferred me to a town in southern Ohio to run one of their offices. I'd been with them about seven years. A year later they fired me for being drunk. I came back to Cleveland and by a fluke, I was offered a job where people pleaded with me to go to work for them, if you can imagine this. This bank was in a lot of financial difficulty at the time due to the fact they'd gone into the finance business. They were starting to finance automobiles and finance dealers. I don't know if you have any automobile dealers in here, but I hope that if we do, you do not fit the pattern that I had been accustomed to meeting in those days. As I always say to anybody more crooked than a piano dealer, it's an automobile dealer. And they took this bank for a real ride and they were ready for taking an awful bath. One of the boys on the board of directors was a man that originally hired me in the finance business years before and they fired him also but not for being drunk. And he was operating a small loan company which was financed by this bank. And And he listened to these board of directors crying in their beer about the problem they're up against. He says, I know just the man that can get us out of this mess. He's the best finance man I have ever met. And he says, and I think he's available. I was available all right. I had come back to Cleveland to stay at my mother's, but he didn't tell them why I was available. They said send for that man. So I went down there and as I stand here, I was drunk when they interviewed me and they to hold board of directors in on this deal. And I was drunk for three and a half years every night of my life that I worked for that bank, and I did the job for them and took them out of that mess. They didn't want to fire me. They had to finally. I'll never forget the day I left. They had a going away party for me. Imagine getting fired and having a going-away party. Only a drunk can have this. This can only happen to a rummy. Nobody else. Normal people don't have these things happen, but you can expect anything of us. You know alcoholics I found out long ago are different than people. We're a breed of cats all our own and when I got that job at that bank I was strictly different than anyone worked there and they made an officer of me immediately and I had to build a department. Now there'd been people working at that bank for 20 years and they were still doing the same job they did when they started, and of course I had problems with those people because they couldn't understand how I should walk in there and be an officer and be half running the place. And they'd been around there for so long. So I had a lot of politics and all that, but a rummy can take care of anything. They never found out how much money I stole from them either. The auditors were very much interested in this, but they never caught on. But I had quite a time. Well, I had one job after they fired me. It lasted three weeks. I used to run into work 8 o'clock in the morning before anyone got there. The only person there was a telephone girl, so she'd report that I showed up, but I never did anything. So after three checks, they canned me also. And I went on the bum. And I was on the bun for a long, long time. And tell you how I wound up. My wife was a member of a very clannish family. This family had invented togetherness, and they exercised this in my home. They were always together there three four or five of them at any given time, and they used to have family conferences. And I was never invited to these conferences. For the simple reason I was usually the subject under discussion and the discussions went as to whether I was going to get thrown out again or let me back in my own home. So they were all earth people, all civilians, and they got to thinking. You know alcoholics don't think. If we think we get in trouble. We emote. But they think and they were very anxious in getting me into some gainful occupation and they had tried about everything and the worst thing that I can look back on is my wife was a very efficient gal in business and she was ahead of the men's department of an employment bureau and she couldn't get me a job either so things were pretty bad so finally they got this idea her brother owned a truck a truck trailer outfit may haul merchandise from Cleveland to New York and back so they got the bright idea that I should go to work for him driving this truck. I should learn to drive this truck and be his helper, and this would kill two birds with one stone. It would give me gainful occupation, at the same time he could ride herd on me and see that I didn't drink. Now that's good thinking, and you can see how these things work out with thinking people. Well, I was not for this deal at all because of a couple of good reasons. First of all, I was never on a truck in my life. The second and most important thing, it's smacked of hard work. And I've always been against hard work, and I still am. And I have maintained that situation all my life, don't ever, you'll never find any blisters on my hands. You might find them somewhere else, but never on my hand. So I, but I had to go along with this deal. So we started off beginning of winter. I'll never forget that because everything happens to me in the wintertime for some reason or other. We started for New York City one night and I was asleep back in the top part of that cab and this is a sleeper cab and my brother-in-law was to sleep on the seat when any sleeping would be done. Well, I had a dollar and some change in my pocket that he did not know about. Of course, rummies always have an ace in the hole and this was my ace. So we drove all night long and I'm going crazy up there. I'm shivering. I hadn't had a drink all day, and I look out that little window and see that 20 tons of stuff following me, and this wasn't comfortable either. And I'm not in very good company. He isn't good company at all, this guy. He don't like me. He belongs to the committee. And so we're traveling to New York State, and he got his breakfast in the morning, which I couldn't handle, of course. And we drove all day long, and I'm about half nuts by this time. And we got to Albany, New York. And he pulled the rig over and said he's going to have to rest for a couple hours or so. So I says, this is fine. He says, Albany is the capital of New York and I've always wanted to see their capital buildings. And that's the first chance I got away from this dodo and away I went. I ran down the street. It's funny these things you remember. A lot of things I can't remember in my career. other people told me about them or else they're a matter of record or something but this I remember I ran into a place the first watering hole I saw and I turned right around left because one look at it I knew it was too rich for a man too rich für my blood anyway so I went down a few blocks and found a place that is more suitable to a man of my estate it was a real dump and i got in there and you know we always somehow or other rummies always get guardian angels somehow keep us going and i met an angel in there i think he was a fairy but i call him an angel because he starts to buying me drinks and drinks and drunks as fast as i drink them and things were going right good and they start getting pretty sticky and I thought it was about time to take leave of my newfound angel. So I went into the men's room, locked the door and went out the window and went back to the truck. I presume my friend is still waiting for me. But I got back there but what happened was this all those drinks that I threw in me at that time must have hit me all at once on the way back to that truck because in my efforts to get up in my nest up here I stepped on that poor boy's face and he came to with a start and of course you know church was out and we had a very very strained relationship all the way to New York City we got to New York City and he threw me out and he says this is the end of the line don't ever come back to Cleveland you're done and don't ever ever come back this is your last chance and there I was I didn't have any overcoat I had no money probably 15 or 20 cents in change I didn't know but one family in that in greater New York and that was another sister of his and she was hostile and she was also at the committee and I she lived in Yonkers so I headed for Yonker's and I remember where she lived she lived way up on top of a hill I remember it because we were there on our honeymoon as I say they did everything together but I remember she lived up there but I didn' t go up on that hill went down the hill and I got in the Italian section down there. Back in the bootleg days, all Italians had wine. A lot of them made it, some of them sold it, most of them drank it, and some of us shared it with their friends. So I went down there and made friends. And by the time I got up to Virginia's house, I was a sight for sore eyes, I'm sure. I don't remember too much about that visit outside of the fact that I was rolling around on the living room floor with her two little babies, little girls two or three years old. And they were having a good time but Virginia didn't think much of this deal so she put me in her car and rode me back down to New York City and threw me out where her brother had thrown me out. And there I was. I was on my own and I existed in New York for a long, long time. I know that I went around the clock because it was winter again when I left. So I existed there and found out how to live for nothing in New York. If you ever get in on the bum, girls and boys, go to New York City. There are more suckers per square mile down there than any place I have ever been, and they all think they're real smart. So, I existed. I never had to buy a meal. I never paid a nickel room rent. I Never paid a nickel for clothes, and I came back home with money in my pocket. You figure it out. I don't go into all those experiences because it might give you some ideas. Anyway, I tell this story for this reason. It has a bearing on how I got here. After I left Virginia's house that night, sometime shortly after she had the doctor over, I presume I must have infected the kids or something, and she was telling the doctor about my visit there. This doctor is also a family friend and she told him what a nice guy I used to be her favorite brother-in-law and what a no good stinking drunken bum I am now and he said this he says you know that's odd he said I had a brother-In-Law who was a lush and he met some strange cult over here in New York at Calvary House at Dr. Schumacher's church and since he met that strange cult he don't drink anymore and he runs around New York City trying to fix drunks and he brings them home and about, he don't have much luck with the drunks. He usually gets his furniture busted up and a few things like that but it keeps him sober and he says there's a doctor in Akron, Dr. Robert Smith. He is also a member of that strange cult in Aklon, Ohio and he said he spends all of his time fixing drunks we used to call it fixing we still call it in our area I do anyway Grace and I have a fixing room at home we fix them in that room well anyway he's telling her about this doctor in Akron of course I don't know this is going on those people are always doing something behind my back but Virginia relayed this information to Dorothy back in Cleveland well sometime later, much much later I got the homing instinct which I guess we all get I wanted to go back home I wasn't welcome but I wantedto go anyway so I recall that one trucker took me as far as Erie and another one brought me in the outskirts of Cleveland where I lived and I lived in a snow belt out there well I got up to my house and snow was four feet deep as I waited to it I'm sure and I looked at that house going in there and one thing I noticed was the screen doors were up and the screens were up in the middle of winter that seemed odd to me so I pound on the door and Dorothy came to the door and open the door, but she did not unhook that screen door. And she talked to me through the screen. And I'm using all my wiles to try to get her to unlock that screen so I could get in the house. But I see I'm getting no place with her. I pointed out to her that people don't leave screens up all winter, that she needed a man around the house to take care of these details. Well, she allowed us how she needed a man to take over the house, but she didn't need one that badly. So I thought I wasn't getting in. But she did this. She had this letter from Virginia and told me about this Dr. Smith in Akron. Would I like to meet him? What can I lose? I can't lose anything going to Akron, and I can transact my business in Akran as well as I can in Cleveland. So she put me in her car. She gave me Doc Smith's name and address. She took me down to the bus depot, and she bought me a one-way ticket to Akran and got rid of me. So that's how I met my sponsor. Well, I got to Akron that morning. I went up to Doc's office in the Second National Bank building and he wasn't in the office. And I waited for him and I pranced up and down in front of that office for a long time. I was afraid to go outside. It was cold and if I got out and got on the stem I might have got picked up so I better wait in there. So finally Doc arrived. Many of you folks who knew Doc knew he was a big fellow about six foot far and he didn't waste any words and he was very gruff and he had fingers on him this long and he did he was really he was hard spoken so I met Doc and he ushered me into his office through his office into another room and then into a back room and I sat down there and I prepared to tell him all my symptoms that's what you do when you go to a doctor but he took the ball away from me and instead of me telling all about myself he starts telling me all about himself and this puzzled me how does this guy know all these things well there's something peculiar going on in Cleveland at that time it was a very gruesome thing there was a hobo jungle down there in Cleveland they called Kingsbury Run back in those depression days some of you folks who have long gray hair can remember this depression in the 30s so you can understand what I'm talking about better than others can and there were a lot of men just homeless wandering around in those days thousands and thousands of them and a lot took up habitat down in his hobo jungle Kingsbury run they also used to take up living in empty houses vacant houses had been foreclosed on. Well anyway, down Kingsbury Run they start finding bodies down there that were dissected and the parts were all wrapped in newspapers. And to my knowledge they found at least seven or eight bodies they found down there. And to my acknowledge they never identified any of them. They were just men who nobody cared about anymore. That was it. So somebody's down there cutting these bodies up and getting their jollies doing that, I guess. And the newspapers were trying to figure out who was doing this and they come to the conclusion that it was either a butcher or a surgeon because it said he had a great, he had good knowledge of anatomy and had a fine technique, if you can have a fine technique cutting people up. But anyway I remember that and this worried me. And sure I'm talking to this doc and doc is And I was walking up and down in front of his office. I look at that stained glass window on his door before he came, and every time I go by, I read this name, Dr. Robert Holbrook Smith, rectal surgeon. Well, this seemed to me to be a strange approach to alcoholism, but that's something new anyway. So when Doc came in, I know he's a surgeon, and he's talking to me and I can't figure out how this guy knows all these things about me. All he's telling me is a drunk story and it's hitting me but I don't know that the blubber isn't working too well. So finally Doc made a fatal error. He come to the conclusion that I needed some be put away for a while to get sober and get straightened out for a few days so he told me he's going to put me in a goonie roost out in Cuyahoga Falls which is a suburb of Akron and he said this where nobody could get at me all of a sudden it dawned on me this is a mad butcher and he's been following me around he's telling me all about myself and I'm his next victim then when he told me he wanted to put me where nobody can get at me about that time I want everyone to get at me well I waited until Doc turned his head and I out of that office and I went through those two rooms like a shot and I never waited for any elevators and I was gone. You know, strange things happen. I went back to Cleveland and resumed my acquaintanceship with my peers, a bunch of bums, and we were all laying around one day and all of us drunk to more or less degrees. Some were up and some down. You know it always makes you feel good to initiate anything with your peers, among your peers. So I think I started this conversation. I said this I said, I'm through with this foolishness I'm going to quit drinking Oh boy Dropped a bomb Some flannel mouth Irishman there He was a head mogul in this gang down there He was the boss He was tough He had a lot of mouth too He says to me He says, you quit drinking You'll never quit drinking I says, I am going to quite drinking He says you'll never quite drinking You don't have guts enough to quit drinkin Now he's drunk too Remember that He says, to quit drinking takes determination. He says to have determination, he says you need a chin. He says look at you, I got a chin like Andy Gump, you're no damn good. I says I am going to quit, I know a doctor in Akron can fix me. He says nobody can fix you, you are no good. I says, I'll show you. He says you show me. My little bit of spark of pride I had left in me, I had to do something. So I got a hold of someone's telephone. We didn't have telephone facilities there, but I broke in somewhere and got ahold of a phone. These were all toll calls. And Doc told me that I called him seven or eight times, but I don't recall it. I only recall talking to him once. And he told me to meet him down at City Hospital the next morning. And I was there. I'll never forget that. I'm in a terrible condition. I don't even have an overcoat at that time. Zero weather. And if any of you folks ever been in Akron, you have, you've been in akron, they'll tell you that Akron is known as a city of seven hills, just like Rome. And in Akran, all their hills are up. They don't have any downhills in Akro. They're all up. And so I got down to that bus depot, got off at the bus depo from Cleveland, but I didn't have the money to get out any car fare to get off to the hospital. And I walked out there in that zero weather in February. And I tell you, I was perspiring when I got out there from weakness. And I only remember going in the lobby of that hospital, and that's the last I remember. I fainted. The next thing I know, I'm up. They're giving me a bath. I'm in bed for some reason or other they're givingme a bath." This seems a little ridiculous. And I opened my eyes, there's a lot of people in white around me. But the first thing I saw that hit me real well was on the window cell, the window there in the room, there was a bottle of rub in there. A bottle of rubbing alcohol. I'd always been scared to death of DTs. I never had them. But I saw people with them and I've seen a few fellows die with them. and I was always scared to death of DTs and I always knew the symptoms and when they were coming because I saw that work on other people and I knew what could give you relief from them a good big shot of booze the most booze you can get in you that'll chase those little guys away so I looked at that alcohol and I made up my mind I'm going to quit drinking but if things get too tough if I see a lot of circus acts going on there's no big tent in there and I hear music and there's no band around there is my answer on that windowsill and I knew there'd be I felt there'd be a bottle of that in every room on that floor and believe you me I would have had myself a handful of bottles with a real past life but it never became necessary and I never took a drink I made a mistake an awful mistake a nurse came in with a tray and she had two big shots on it she had a great big shot of liquor and a great big shot of whitey substance. And she says, Mr. Snyder, we have some medicine here for you. I want you to take this medicine and drink it down and then wash it down with this nice whiskey. Well, I looked at her. I know what that white stuff is. It's peraldehyde. It'll knock you down flatter than a rug. And, of course, I knew what the booze was. So I'm looking at that alcohol on the windowsill and I told her, I got on my high horse, I said, I'll thank you to take that room and stuff away from me. I came here to quit drinking, not to drink. I gave her Hail Columbia, you know. And boy, she took it away. And away she went. And I never even got a sobering up or a tapering off drink all the time I was in that hospital. I was there about a week. And I suffered the agonies of the damned in that Hospital. I don't mind telling you, you stay drunk as many years as I was drunk and quit like that without any tapering-off. I don't have to tell some of you people what that's like so don't give me any talk about what a hard time you had I can top you so anyway I lay in that hospital for a week and after a couple days the men who preceded me the alcoholics in the Oxford group came to visit me there were 14 of these men came to see me and they told me the stories of their life through booze, what happened to them these men were all 10, 15, 20 years older than I was I was only 35 then and the only thing about it I just worked faster than they did I guess but they went through the same experience as they did and they taught me the story of their lives and then when they got ready to leave they'd all tell me one thing They told me they had the answer to my drinking problem. Then on that note, they left. They didn't tell me what the answer was. Well, Doc came in to see me every afternoon and he sat on the foot of my bed and looked at me. And I'm scared of this guy, don't forget. I still have the idea that he's a killer. The papers referred to this person, whoever was doing these dastardly acts, was the mad butcher of Kingsbury Run. so I had a big idea that Doc is a mad butcher I really did so he came and looked at me and so this last day I'm in there, he comes in he says well young fella what do you think of all this by now he called me young fella because I was only 35 years old and they didn't have any of these people at age 10 I said well Doc I think it's wonderful these fellas all come in and talk to me and they don't know me from a load of hay and they tell me all about themselves but I'm puzzled about one thing And he says, and what's that? I says, they all tell me they have the answer to my drinking problem and then they leave. They don't tell me what the answer is. What comes next? What are you going to do to me now? What's going to happen? He threw me a real curve. He says, well, young fellow, we don't know about you. You're pretty young. And we haven't had any luck with these young fellows. They're all screwballs. Well, I wasn't going to argue that point with him. but I guess I finally convinced him that I had enough I weighed 130 pounds in that hospital been drunk for several years I'd been out of my home for a long, long time and on the bum I didn't have any more home than a rabbit I didn' t have any money I had no job for a very long time I'd spent between jobs for several year I had nothing no friends nothing so what do you have to be to be ready I guess I finally convinced him okay young fellow I'll give you the answer to this so here it comes he says turns and looks at me and put that big finger at me he says young fellow do you believe in God man that's the last thing I expected to hear from a doctor I listen to that kind of stuff in the missions you always say yes in a mission if you need a coat or a pair of shoes or something God what's he good what's a what's of what's a doctor talking about God so this kind of stunned me so I have to evade this question because I didn't have much of a regard for any such thing as that in that time of my life and so you don't evade doc so I says to him I this I thought this is pretty bright I said well what does that have to do with it he said young fellow that has everything to do that do you or do you not believe in God? Now I'm getting worried. They're not going to fix me if I don't go along with this bird. So the next one I go up with, I said, well, I guess I do. He says, there is no guessing about it. You do or you don't. Boy, this is a way to give the spiritual aspect and foundation of this program to your new people. Remember that. Now I know I'm hooked. I got to agree with this guy or I'm out of the whole ballgame. So I finally says, okay, yes, I do believe in god. he says that's fine I'll wait and get someplace get down out of that bed I said for what get on your knees on my knees this guy is a rectal surgeon with the long fingers so he piles me out of that bed on that concrete floor in that shorty nightjohn and I'm waiting to see what's going to happen and he says you're going to pray I said who's going to pray he said you're going to pray. I said, I don't know anything about praying. He says, I don't suppose you do, but you get down there, I'll pray and you can repeat after me and that will do for this time. So I'm down there on my knees and he puts his hand on my head and he uttered a prayer. I don' t remember what it was. I have a pretty good idea. But I do remember this, that after he concluded, he shook hands with me. He said, young fellow, you're going to be all right. And that night he carried me to a meeting of the Oxford group at the home of T. Henry and Clarissa Williams in Akron there was no AA then this was they were meeting with the Oxford group most of the people in the Oxford group were civilians they were not drunks the drunks everybody in the Oxford group was in there because he was a sinner they have a book one of their books that they had is entitled For Sinners Only the Oxford group was For Sinner's Only and everyone was a sinner and if they wanted to get rid of their sins and get those things rectified they go by the Oxford group program and that's this would all be taken care of so the drunks came along they were the outstanding sinners they were very they were very visible sinners the rest of the people all hide their sins but the drunks don't hide it very well we are walking advertisements of what we are so we were the worst we're the horrible examples well anyway what happened he took me to this Oxford group meeting I got a few shocks I mean about three in a row. When I walked into that meeting, I see all those lovely people just like look like you folks here and nicely dressed up genteel people they're having a great old time everybody's hugging everybody and all this kind of business going on but what is going on in this place, see? But there were more women in there than there were men and I couldn't figure that out I hadn't been in any feminine company in a long time for some reason or other but these so I walk into that place and I don't know what in the world is they're doing. They seem to be so happy and everything, and I looked at that house when I walked in there. I hadn't been in a home like that for many a long day. T. Henry Williams was a multi-millionaire. He had a patent on something that had to do with tires, and he got a little rake off on every tire that was made in Akron, so you can see he wasn't hurting for anything. So I So I go in that home, and here's a beautiful home with oriental rugs on the floor, grand piano over in a corner, paintings on the wall, some little bric-a-brac sitting around those little figures. And I looked at those figurines and took a good inventory of them, but a piano is too much to handle. But anyway, I knew what was around there, and I made my grand entrance in among those beautiful people without an overcoat, and I had one black shoe on and one brown shoe. I think someone else had a pair like that somewhere. Somehow or other we got mixed up along the line somewhere. So that was my grand entrance into the Oxford group. And those people were wonderful to me, especially some of the ladies. Said, I'll forever be indebted to some of those non-alcoholic women, Annie Smith, Doc's wife, Henrietta Seiberling, Henriette Dotson. They went out of their way to make me feel comfortable and show me love and consideration. And I had the next shock I got. I looked across the room, and who is sitting across there but my wife Dorothy, who wouldn't even let me in the house. Apparently, Doc called her and sold her a bill of goods on giving me another shot at staying home. So she came down to see what it's all about. And she took me home that night to Cleveland, back and put me in my house. And she kept me there for a little over a year, which was great. Then she threw me out sober. This can happen to people, and I understand it. It's hard for me to understand at the time. But Dorothy was a great person. She was a wonderful person. She had a lot of talent. But here's what happened. For years, people come to our home. This has probably happened to some of you people. I bet it hasn't. I wonder what struck you. When anyone was coming to our house, they were looking for Dorothy. They sure wasn't looking for me. And all I come back there and I start AA and all over the place. And first thing you know, people are coming to the home, knocking on the door, asking for me, not drunks, but people who are concerned with this alcohol problem because there had never in history been any solution for the alcoholic up to this time and a lot of people got very curious about it. People in religion and some of the social workers and such were pounding on the door and they're asking for me and not her and she got her nose out of joint about this and she couldn't take it. So I was running around trying to take my place as a man of the house and that just went over like a lead balloon. I'd been a bum too long and she couldn't put that confidence in me and she was a little jealous of all the stuff I understand this for all of me she did the right thing as far as she could see so she said to me one day hey Buster, this is worse than when you were drunk we better try this separate again and so she packed my little bag and set me out and that was the end of me I never went back well, a lot of things have happened since you know this Oxford group is where we were born AA was born in the Oxford group a lot of people get some crazy idea that somebody sat down on Central Park and wrote these 12 steps out like that, you hear all these kooky stories and none of them are true they're romanticists the Oxford Group had six steps and the four absolutes of honesty unselfishness, purity and love The six steps of the Oxford group, number one was complete deflation. Now you figure these along with our 12 steps and you'll see where our program came from. Second step was dependence and guidance from a higher power. Excuse me, I've got to... Okay, please. The third step was a moral inventory. the fourth step was confession and that was public confession and private confession the fifth step was restitution and the sixth step was continued working with others that was the six steps we just expanded into twelve steps when we wrote that book Alcoholics Anonymous we figured that if an alcoholic could screw up six steps he could screw it up and screw up twelve much easier it gives them more latitude the alcoholic is different than people as I said before everybody can't be an alcoholic really I think there's a very small percentage of the population that can become alcoholic no matter how hard they try or how much they drink they'll never become alcoholic because they're just not made right alcoholics are put together They're different than earth people. I'll tell you some of the characteristics you look for in the alcoholic. Now, there are two kinds of drinkers. There are drunks and there are alcoholics. Every alcoholic is a drunk, but every drunk is not an alcoholic. You can figure that one out. I drank with drunks in these bottle gangs that drank as much booze as I could, and I grant you that's quite an order. But they were not alcoholics because they could quit drinking any time they got a different hobby. But not me. I couldn't quit. The alcoholic is made different. I never met an alcoholic worthy of the name that was not a high-strung individual. I never meant one that wasn't very impulsive. He's an impulsive creature. I never mean one that he's never a deep thinker. You never don't talk about thinking to an alcoholic. When they brought those think signs in, hey, this is a disgrace. This is an insult. I know how they came here. There was a fellow, I knew this fellow very well, a nice guy, but he got thinking and that's a bad thing for an alcoholic to do. And he got a hold of a bunch of those think signs that the IBM company puts out. They distribute them all the offices around the country and they hang them over the water cooler to get the employees back on the job. So think. They tell them to think. Well, he got hold of a whole bale of these things and he dutifully sent one, I guess he got the world directory and he sent these think signs to every group and every person he knew in AA and they dutifically hung them on the wall and it says think. Boy, if you had one here, I'd take it down. You don't have one here. You're getting smart here. Don't have those things around. He's not a deep thinker. He's emotional. He acts like this. He does something. He's impulsive. He's going to think. he's impulsive and he's a doer an alcoholic I've always said this he can operate on 30% of his mental capacity and beat the socks off of ordinary people that are operating on 80% of theirs beat them every day I demonstrated that in my own experience at that bank it was something if you knew what I had to put up with there and what I pulled off there and what i did every alcoholic can do it we're made this way there are a great bunch of people you'll find alcoholics they can accomplish things where people think are impossible so we don't sit around and think about it we do something we move and most of the time we move in the right direction and so we accomplish things they are very emotional people alcoholics are emotional they only respond to feeling thank you They don't respond to any logic or common sense. That's the big failing that a lot of our dry-out places have today. They get all these high-priced psychiatrists and psychologists in who mean very well, but a lotof them want an alcoholic to get thinking. Don't ever get an alcoholicto think. You're going to destroy him. But they will do something. They'll act. They emote. They'll never make any decisions on emotion, on thinking, just on emotion. when we hurt badly enough we'll do something this is the way that we come into AA there was a saying in the old Oxford group that man's extremity is God's opportunity when we reach the end of our line and hit our bottom then God can do something with us up to that time forget it the alcoholic is going to run things himself so we have to come to that place the alcoholic is a lonely person he's lonely in a crowd he's lonely in a crowd he's an introvert he pulls away from people you can never get too close to a rummy you come so close and he'll have his hand out there that's far enough brother he's been hurt and he don't want to get hurt again he spears that hurt so that's the way he's very very sensitive he's a very sensitive soul he's always going around looking for someone to hurt his feelings he has a very deep inferiority complex a feeling of inadequacy he's the biggest liar that ever wore shoes he isn't satisfied with ordinary lying he practices it he does it when he don't have to he comes adept at it he's an expert he's a biggest liar that there is and he's full of self-justification an alcoholic can justify anything there's nothing we can't justify When I would get in some kind of a jam, it wasn't my fault. There was a bunch of circumstances happening and I got caught up into it. It wasn't me after all. See? I'm in the junk there rattling those cages. It wasn�t my fault." No, something happens. It wasn �t my fall at all. He has a terrific imagination. They all ought to write books. We have an imagination that you wouldn�t believe. Alcoholics, you would get them started on that thing, and away they go into the yonder here. He's an alcoholic at the tops in his chosen line. I don't care if he's a nurse, if he is a lawyer, if it's a doctor, if he was an Indian chief, a mechanic, a salesman or whatever, you'll always find him in the top ten. Always! He's best, he's the tops. Because he does things where other people don't and he absorbs things faster. You don't sit around making decisions. he's like I often say I don't make apologies for this but let me tell you this you look around AA and find out how many legitimate I'm talking about legitimate pipe smokers you got in AA zero you might find a bird around here that puffs on a pipe and says well he's a fake the real pipe smoker has 30 pipes and he has one for January 1st one for the 2nd, one forthe 3rd and he's got them in a rack there he'll never take number 1 and use it on 4th day he waits till the 1st of next month he's deliberate in everything he does an alcoholic is never deliberate he just boom, he goes and the fur flies that's he'll do things well so much for the rummy what is alcoholism a lot of people talk about alcoholism as being a taste matter boy he or she loves her liquor she must live if she drinks two or three quarts a day she must love it that's our biggest crap in the world we don't love the taste of booze most alcoholics I know hate to taste the booze the proof and evidence of that is if you get in the economic pinch and you can't afford palatable booze you'll drink anything when I quit drinking the last couple of years of my drinking I paid seven cents a pint for my booze and I bought it in a wallpaper store now if you think I drank that for its palatable qualities try it and call a hearse when you do because the first time you try that it's going to kill you you've got to work yourself down to that it's a progression the wrong way so an alcoholic will drink anything when he has to when the chips are down and he don't have the dough he'll get drunk just the same he'll buy it steal it drink rub he'll drink anything at all I sponsored a girl one time and this girl she was married to a lawyer and they had money in that family but this girl was drunk all the time on lemon extract. She bought it by the case, lemon extract, she's drunk as a skunk all the times on lemon extract. I don't know what the big taste in lemon extract was, but that's the only thing she drank, she didn't drink whiskey. I had to put her in a dry out place for 30 days. She was in a terrible shape on lemon extract. But we'll drink anything. If this were a matter of taste, we could take care of that in a hurry, we'd cultivate a taste for something different than booze. We could cultivate a taste for apples or bananas or something. I don't know who wants to eat 40 bananas a day, but we could cultivate a taste for something else and then the problem would be over. Then they talk about this being a habit. It's not a habit We had a pattern, but it's not a habit Any habit we have we can break This habit of smoking that most people are trying to kill themselves with today These cigarettes If someone come along and the doctor told you If you didn't quit smoking cigarettes, you'd be dead in 30 days. There isn't a person sitting in this room that wouldn't quit in three days. It would hurt. It'd be a little inconvenient and so forth, but you'd do it. So a habit you can change by substitution and a little willpower and a little suffering. And then there's other people, you know, this is not a taste or habit. Drinking to an alcoholic is an obsession. And that's entirely different than a taste for a habit. That's a different condition. that's a drive and that's what we have to deal with when we're alcoholic and we have to get cleared of that obsession. When I was a drinking alcoholic, everything I would do, every decision I'd make if I were going to a party, a picnic, a funeral or a wedding or a business conference or what, the first thing I had to consider was the liquor situation. Is there going to be booze there? How much and how quick can I get it? No booze, no clearance. Very simple. my life revolved around the idea of a drink. Not the drink itself, the idea of a drunk. I associated with drinking people. Drink was my life and the idea for drinking was always foremost in my considerations. So that's what we have to contend with now. How are we going to change that? We're in that situation. What's to be done with an alcoholic like that? Alcoholism is probably the oldest malady that afflicts the human race. Believe me, alcoholism's been here a long, long time. As long as history's been recorded, we've had alcoholics and alcoholism. You read about alcoholics in ancient history, you read about them in mythology, and you read abut them in the Bible. There's some good rummy stories in the bible, believe me. If I had time, I might tell you some of them after a while. but you don't have to go any further than the first book of the Bible and you meet your first rummy if you meet old Noah he was one of us a lot of people don't realize that but you read that story and you'll know that he was here's old Noah the God-fearing man the world is getting itself in about the same condition it is today everything going downhill hell bent for election and God got so disgusted with all his people he decided to flood the whole world and start all over again but he needed some seed so he went to his friend Noah he says, Noah my boy I want that you should do something for me being a God-fearing man he says anything, Lord anything tell me what you want so he told him I want you to build a big boat and he gave him the dimensions of this ark and he says I want your family to build this and after you've completed it I want you to put two of every living creature in that and your family because I'm going to flood this whole world and destroy the whole cotton-picking thing and start all over again. Okay, old Noah says, I'll do that. So his family got out there hewing logs and pounding and building this yacht and went on for years. They're working on this thing. And his loving neighbors come by. What are you doing, Noah? I'm building a boat. you're building a boat out in the middle of a desert poor old Noah he's playing with a short deck shingles off the roof so they laugh at old Noah and go on their way but they kept on building this boat and after it completed started to rain those neighbors come pounding on the door but he had the door closed already he had all the animals in there and everything nobody else got in but his family and those rains came and they rained for 40 days and 40 nights and that old ark came up and started floating around floating around for days and days and day finally the water receded went down land came up and the ark rested on Mount Ararat and the old Noah looked around opened that gate what was the first thing our friend Noah did read this story in Genesis the first book of the Bible Noah runs out there he planted a vineyard he raised some grapes he made some wine and got drunk he had an old boy who was planting that all the time he's floating around in the dark he's a rummy there's a lot of good rummy stories in the Bible boy, some of that that story of the Good Samaritan boy, there's a rumy story there's the first twelve step call on record did you ever read that story did you never get it in Sunday school here's that old boy lying there on the long side of the road stripped naked beat up he's bleeding he's all in his clothes are gone he has nothing you know what happened to that old boy don't you he got drunk and he got rolled I don't know if any of you ever got rolled but he'd made it and he's lying there drunk and in his agony and unconscious and along came that priest and he saw him lying there and he's a man of the world and he has seen drunks rolled before and he said the very words you hear from people today he says good enough for that dirty old drunken bum he got himself in that condition let him get himself out of it so he passed by on the other side and left the old boy laid there in his misery so along came this Levite he was likewise a man-of-the-world he'd seen guys rolled before also and he saw this fella and he says the same thing that this priest said. The dirty, stinking, drunken bum he got himself in that shape let him get himself out of it and he passed by on the other side and left him lying there naked and in misery. Then along came this Samaritan fellow. This Samaritian fellow they were not the chosen people in those days and this fellow was a traveling salesman and I'll prove that to you too. So he comes along on his form of conveyance which certainly wasn't a Chevrolet it was probably a mule and he sees this old boy lying there and what did he do? Did he pass them by? No siree He got down off his conveyance and he ministered to him What does it say he did in the Bible? He gave him a drink and he poured wine in his wounds See Did he leave them lie there? Nope He picked him up and put him on his form of conveyance and took him to the Holiday Inn It says he took him to an inn anyway And here's how I know they're all rummies in that deal This salesman says to the innkeeper he says here Mr. Innkeeper take care of this fellow here is some money you see he gave the money to the inkeeper he didn't give them to the drunk he says and here's how I know he's a traveling salesman making that territory he says and if there be any more due I will repay you on my next visit through here read that story it's in the New Testament that's the first twelve step call on record it's been going on a long time these stories there's a lot of them there's not a good story I don't want to take any time to tell you more, but they're in there. Read the Bible. You might learn something about that. It won't hurt anybody. So this whole program came out of the Bible, came out at the Sermon on the Mount and the Book of James. Those six steps of the Oxford group came out of the Serman on the Mountain. If you want to know more about your AA program, study the 5th, 6th, and 7th chapter of Matthew and you have the whole works. the book of James is used that's the the book of James is the theme of that is faith without works is dead and it's also the healing ministry it tells you what to do if you're sick and we are really sick people so if you want to know how to get well read the book of James it'll tell you in the fifth chapter what to do if you are sick very plain this is the simplest program there is I don't know how people can complicate it the way they do it's so simple we try to make something out of it that it isn't we try and make a big organization or some kind of rules and regulations for this thing all we need is what I'm talking about sermon on the mountain, a book of James you've got the whole thing wrapped up in a bundle all we have to do is use it it's there, it's been there for a long time you know what's amazing I have a book home it's about Jay Thicke about the history of alcoholism this book was written in the early 1800s and it tells about the different things that were tried to curb alcoholism and straighten out the rummy and they all failed not until about 40 years ago was there a solution for the alcoholic up to this time all down through these hundreds and hundreds of years the alcoholic only had two options he could go crazy or he could die or both about 40 years ago when AA came into being when we broke away from the Oxford group the alcoholic got a third option he can still go crazy he can stay alive he can die but now he can get well and believe me kids this was never so in history before we are pioneers in something here Now, our chairman said I organized a third group of AA. It was not the third. I organized the first group of AAA. Regardless of what some of this history that you read that comes out in such fine literature, it's not true. Don't believe everything you read. I guess anybody will tell you that, but there was no AA until May of 1939. Our book was written in the fall of 1938 and it came out in February 39. Three months later AA, the first AA group was formed and that came and that was the first riot we had in the whole fellowship. Here's why we broke away from the Oxford group, and here's why AA started as it is today. It's something you don't read in this literature, but you're hearing it from the horse's mouth. I was there. The Oxford group was a Protestant evangelical fellowship and organization, and only Protestants belonged to it. There were no Catholics in it for the simple reason that The Catholic Church would not permit their members to belong to an Oxford group because of the forms and ceremonies and the different things that the Oxford group engaged in. It's like open confession and reading out of the King James Version of the Bible and getting guidance for other people and so forth. They reserved those things for themselves, and the Catholic Church in those days was pretty adamant about these things. So out ofthe first dozen men that I took down to Akron, And I might say here, when I left that Oxford group that first night in Akron, Doc told me to go back to Cleveland and spend the rest of my life fixing rummies as an avocation. And he underlined that. He emphasized avocation, saying you're supposed to make a living and you're suppose to have a ministry of fixing rummies. And I went back to Cleveon. Now you get this picture. There was no AA book. There was no literature, there was no group, there was no nothing. I'm alone in Cleveland, Ohio and it's no shortage of rummies, believe me, the woods were full of them. They were falling all over the place. And I'd go up to some rummy on the street and I'd say, hey, you ought to quit drinking, you oughta be like me. Well that's a great approach. You can imagine the reception I got. I don't mind telling you that some of it was physical. I went and made contacts with all kinds of church people, social workers and club people and doctors and the courts and every place else telling them all if they had rummies that they're having problems with send them to me and I'll fix them. And this went on for seven months before I sold my first baby. And this is a selling job. Some muttonhead come in with this statement that this is a program of attraction rather than promotion. attraction my necktie whoever wants to get attracted to a bunch of drunks anyway the last thing people want is a bunch of drucks around this is a sales job you're selling the greatest thing that there is possible to sell you're telling you're giving a person a chance to live you're sending them a chance for sanity you're setting them a chance to have a life you're showing them a chance to have life yes after this life also don't ever forget that we're taking people and taking them out of nothing and making something real out of them bringing them back to their God then I hear all these people talking about this higher power business higher power my necktie my higher power has a name and I call him Jesus if you want to meet him I'll be glad to introduce you to him if you don't know him and this is what people do we do this with people and they don't drink anymore I don't meet new people anymore in AA I meet people who've been washed out and washed back and washed out some of them have been sober a long time some of whom haven't but they hear about this fluky guy down in Castleberry, Florida that has some funny way of fixing people taking them through steps and they never drink anymore and they have a good life and they get curious about it because they're sober and miserable yet there's a lot of miserable people walking around I don't have to tell you that Some people are having a great life. Other people, they're missing something greatly here. So they come down, and I have a qualification. I won't work with a person unless he qualifies. I think it's a great privilege to belong to AA. This isn't a cafeteria where you come in and take what you want and leave the rest go out the window like a lot of people tell you. That's wrong. We have a definite program here of these 12 steps. Now, people come down there and I have a qualification for him. Here's what it is. Maybe this man has been drunk and sober, drunk or something. Maybe he hasn't, but he's miserable. So he comes down, he's curious. He knows I have something he don't have. So he come and says I have three questions I have to ask him. First thing is this. I have know he's an alcoholic. He has to know it and he has to admit it. That's first. I should know it. He should know that. He should admit it and he has to commit it. Well, okay. He admits it. So I'm satisfied after sharing with him that he's a rummy and he knows I am and he doesn't know what I'm talking about. So the next thing I ask him, what do you want to do about it? You're a rumby, what are you going to do? What do you think he wants to do with it? He says, well, I want to quit. Oh, that's wonderful, boy. A lot of guys have quit if I'll quit for them. You don't like to hear that too well. But I like to ruffle him up a little bit. And the third question, here's the one that really puts it to him. After he tells me he wants to quit, I ask him this what are you willing to do to quit drinking forever wow you get some funny answers on that one because forever is a long long time tell that to some poor rummy that hasn't had a week sobriety in years and think of forever that's impossible but i keep with him until he gives me the answer i want and there's only one answer he can give me if he wants me to work with him he must tell me he's willing to do anything now I didn't make that up kids that's in our fifth chapter that's how it works that we hear about all the time it says in here very plainly if you want what we have and are willing to go to any lengths to get it you are now ready to take certain steps isn't that as plain as a nose on your face so that's why I ask him what are you willing to do. He has to tell me he's willing to do anything. If he don't tell me that, forget it. He can go home. I have nothing for him. I don't temporize with my program. I have a program and that's it. I'm adamant about it. If they want what I have, they'll do it my way, not their way. They've had their way long enough. You know, several weeks ago, an odd thing happened and I just want to try this. There's a fellow down in our area, Grace and I have known this fellow for 11 years since we've been in Orlando area and that bimbo comes to meetings probably every day you'll find him in a meeting either noon or at night or maybe both and every night he goes home and drinks. This has been going on for 11 days for 11 hours. So somebody told him he ought to come and talk to me and I've known this guy and I stay away from him because I don't like to be around negative influences too much because they wear me out I got so much time I want to spend having some little fun out of life so he came up to me one day and asked me if he could come over and talk to me about this program and go through the steps and I evaded him I wouldn't do it I passed him off came back in a week or two giving me another pitch he wanted to come over and then another one and another one I told Grace about it and she knows this turkey she says boy she says if you can fix that guy you can sit on the right hand of God well I says I tell you I'm going to try something with him he's asked me four times usually three strikes are out he's ask me four time so I'll give him a walk so I said to him you come over Monday morning at 11 o'clock and we'll go into this well he showed up at 10 it's alright but he was there I don't get up that early but I was up and I had that man in my house till half past 5 and I never started him through the steps because he would not answer that third question what are you willing to do to quit drinking forever he had always had some excuse why he wouldn't do the whole thing I'd never have stayed with a person that long and I'll never do it again but I tried I bust my hind end trying to fix this guy to get him to admit that he'd go to any lengths and he goes to meetings once or twice a day and he hears that red every time he goes to a meeting what are you going to do with a dingbat like that it's only one thing you do let him go I regret the time I wasted with him because I could be spending my time with someone that could use what I have I have only so much time so much energy so much inclination so much wisdom so much knowledge and I'm gonna put it I'm going to try to plant my seeds where they have a chance to grow and I'm not going to nurse anybody I went all through that nursing stuff long ago I've been all through those stages I know what it takes Grace and I have the same kind of ministry people come to us from all over the country not from Orlando down there we're I'm a bum yeah a prophet is without honor in his own hometown you know that says that in the Bible Jesus got that bill of goods thrown at him and he said it too no but I go 100 miles away I'm an authority but at home forget it they get used to you they don't pay attention to you so that's alright I hope they pay attention to somebody but by the looks of some of them they're not doing very well but that's their business if they want help I'll be there to help them If they qualify if there's always that if Now that I read you those 12 to those six steps of the Oxford group I Don't think I have to go into these 12 steps of ours They amount to the same thing It takes a long time for me to go over these 12 Steps and I know that you fellas and gals want to get out of here sometime tonight I'm not fussy about it myself. I stay here all night night. But what I'd like to do is let you know how this fellowship started. I took these, I had seven fellows, the first man I ever sponsored was a Polish fellow and he had been a Catholic. He wasn't a very good one obviously, he hadn't seen his family in several years and God knows when he'd ever been in church last but he was drunk all this time. He had been an auditor for Sherwin-Williams Paint Company, and of course got canned out of that long since. Then after I got him, it took me seven months before I got my first baby, seven months, after talking to hundreds and hundreds and hundres of disordered rummies, dipsomaniacs, drunks, what have you, got my First Man. Then right after that a whole bunch of them start coming, and I had a dozen. Now I know why it took be seven months to get my first baby. It says something in our program here about carrying a message. We carry the message. I didn't have a message, it took me seven months to get a message! I had a lot of brass, a lot of time, a lotta ignorance and a lot o' ego or what have you. I didn't hava a message it took 7 months before I sold my first baby because after that these fellas came in we had a dozen of them going to Akron. had an Irish invasion right after this Polack. Oh, they came in. We had seven Catholics out of the first dozen and what happened was this. I took these boys down to Akron and they watched that Oxford group situation and they told me they can't abide it, they can take it. The church won't allow it. So, what are we going to do about it? Well, we just got the book out in february and this is may three months later so i went down to see my sponsor doc smith and told him our problem they had no catholics in the oxford group in new york or in or in akron either but we got the deluge of them there so i went down and see doc about it and told them our problem he says well we're not keeping the catholics out i said no you're not keep them out but their church keeps them out it's it's all the same thing they can't come he says well that's their tough luck I said no doc that doesn't have to be I said now remember I'm only 15 months sober I'm telling my sponsor all about it already I don't know why I waited that long they don't do that today so I said no we got a 12 step program and the four absolutes of honesty unselfishness purity and love in the Oxford group and anyone can live with that program whether he has a religion or none you can deliver with that program he says well you can't do that I said can't do what he says you can break this thing up I said I'm not trying to break anything up I'm trying to open it up so everybody can get in he says I can't do that I said well we're going to do something he says like what I said you'll see that's where I broke with my sponsor I had another Irishman in the hospital he was a patent lawyer Al Goldrick and he had a big home up on Cleveland Heights he was losing the home He's also about ready to get kicked out of his law firm, but he saved it all by coming in. And I went out to see his wife, asked her about using their home for a meeting place. I didn't say anything to Al. He wouldn't know what I was talking about anyway. He was all smoked up with paraldehyde. She was delighted with the idea of having a meeting in her home. So I went down to Akron the next week, and here's how AA started. Listen to this one. I made the announcement down there that this is the last time the Cleveland contingent will be down here as a group. We are starting our own group in Cleveland, Ohio next Thursday night and I made the mistake of giving them the address I shouldn't have done this as I learned later at 2345 Stillman Road, Cleveland Heights next Thursday Night and I said this and here's what killed them. Those people had been so good to us. I says this is not going to be known as an Oxford group it's going to being known as Alcoholics Anonymous we're taking a name from the book and I said, only alcoholics and their families are welcome, nobody else well you can imagine the hubbub the roof came off the house those people have been so good to us and everything and here I'm shutting them out and they said, Clarence, you can't do this you've got to come down and talk about it I said there's nothing to talk about it's done oh, that was awful we had an awful riot down there but if I thought that was a riot you ought to have been up to Stillman Road next Thursday night oh, that whole group descended upon us and tried to break our meeting up one guy was going to whip me this is all done in pure Christian love I don't want you to know that and we had a riot now that was our first unity that's what I call unity AA grows on unity to me unity is a riot nobody starts a group because we need a group somebody gets mad at somebody and if they stay together they'll start choosing up sides and start using ball bats on each other this is how it grows it never grows because somebody's too big somebody gets mad and has to start a group somebody will say who's that guy who does he think he is running this group he thinks he's the smartest I could run a group better than he does on my lunch hour then he talks to a couple of his buddies about it and they agree with him first thing you know that friction comes up and first thing they know there's a division and the next thing they get another group that's what I call unity if we ever have unity the way some of these birds describe unity, we have one great big group and there will be about four people doing all the work and everybody else getting drunk there are a lot of people who have to be leaders, they're not going to sit back in that chair, they are going to have to pee in the swim, they got to do something, theyre doers and they have a lot of imagination, get up and go, right wrong or otherwise theyre going to do something and this is why we have so many groups We were in Chicago just a week or so ago. About a week ago, I guess it was. I can't keep track of time anymore. And I looked at that bunch in Chicago and I remember I happened to sponsor the first person in Chicago and it was a girl. And this gal, Sylvia Kaufman, she was in a hospital in Chicago. She'd been in and out of that hospital many times drunk. Just show you how God works. his works in such mysterious ways she's in that hospital in Chicago and as it happened I had a sister-in-law who was a nurse in that Hospital in Chicago and she'd seen Sylvia come in there all pilled up and boozed up and what not on various occasions and she said to Sylvia you know you're an alcoholic and you're killing yourself what you ought to do is go to Cleveland and see my brother-in law and he'll fix you and Sylvia was a lady of means she had a nice income from her last husband who owned a newspaper and she came to Cleveland and bounced into my house this is while I was staying in there with Dorothy and my heavens to Betsy, she was a real spook she'd come in there all full of pills and booze and she could walk through walls without opening doors she was awful You had to follow her around. She smoked cigarettes incessantly. She lit them, I don't know if she smoked them. And she'd light them and there's cigarettes here and cigarettes there. You had keep following her around, she'd burn the bloody house down. This went for several weeks. I went through all of her luggage, all of haar garments, through the seams of her garments. I inspected everything, everything that was legal I looked into. And I never found her pills. But finally, I guess she ran out of pills and she started getting sane. And I gave her Earl Treat's name back here in Chicago. Earl had been in the Oxford group in Akron when I was down there and he'd been transferred, his business took him up to Chicago but he never did a thing about working with anyone. He just sat there in his big fat duff. And I give her his name and address and Sylvia went and grabbed a hold of Earl. And the two of them along with Grace's secretary, Grace Cullis they went out and started this activity in Chicago And heavens to Betsy, I looked at that activity last week in Chicago and it's unbelievable. They have thousands and thousands and millions of people going to meetings there all the time. And I remember when there's just two of them, you know? I remember When I was the only one in Cleveland and I looked up at that group up there in Stillman Road one night I can still remember this like it was last night I said, Boy, wouldn't it be wonderful if we ever had as many as 35 members in this meeting. It wasn't two years' time. We had 35 groups in Cleveland already. We got those, I've got a drunken reporter who was in a nut house and I fished him out of the nut house and got his wife to let him get him released and he wrote some articles for the Cleveland Plain Dealer and we got about two weeks running of publicity in the Cleveland Plain dealer and that's the first publicity we ever had. It brought people, inquiries from all over this country and I give a whole handful of inquiries every Monday morning to every man there and he'd go out and I tell him report to me on Wednesday what you did with her just like a sales manager and they did that. They ran ragged those guys there chasing these leads down and I went out on a lot of myself and boy we start getting people in so fast and the inquiries were coming so fast that the number of men we had we could we couldn't handle it and I had to look for some place where I could teach people in classes, teach them AA in classes. If you can imagine this, they're coming in that fast. There's too many for one-on-one anymore and God takes care of us in everything we need. If he asks, if we have a need and ask him, he always fills it. So I need a place and we had no money to rent any hall so I was out on one of these inquiries one day and this guy's name is Walter Beilstein.