The Fourth Legacy of Experience – Tim M.

As I said, I have nothing to judge by as to the amount of feet. The meeting room is about the size of this first section here and all, and maybe a little bit larger, but approximately. Then we have a little office space where we also make coffee for our meetings and so on and so forth and that is about eight foot square on the one side the next room back beyond that is our tape room which is about 8 by 12 and then beyond that a small area that we have storage of the supplies and things for the area for their various functions and then across from that we have an area where we showed motion pictures and various things like that which is about eight by ten and this is this is approximate to this and then of course then there's the restroom in there and then we have the larger storage area where we have our files are and we have file cabinets we have the 14 file cabinets in that room and then with shelves above there and And we have a file for each one of our districts there for material which is donated and where we store it until we can sort it and put it into files and various things. And then the files and the binders are placed on the shelves up above which extend to the ceiling, which is about a nine-foot ceiling. And that is the amount of space that we have. Do you have to keep the first column still on? We try to, yes, as much as possible. We leave the heat on there at a lower temperature. We don't run it high, but in the wintertime especially, why we definitely leave the heating on and all. now how do you finance what's your budget we are financed mainly we get fifty dollars a month from the area and then our contributions at our meetings and various other things whatever anybody might want to donate will take where does the four and a quarter come from that comes from the area yeah mm-hmm and that has been since back in the early 80s yes fortunately we had some members of a who were getting rid of their file cabinets and things and they were donated and we've had a lot of donations of materials the word gets out and all, you'll be surprised what you can get as donations from members I have no idea what the tax bid is for the individual that gives them yes, yes, yeah so the thing is just to put the word out and tell people what you need in all. And it's one of the things that even though we have these rooms and the file cabinets, etc., those rooms where we have the tapes and the various films and also the file cabinet for each district, you know, drawers for each district and so on and so forth, those rooms are kept locked because we found out early in the game when some of the other groups were having meetings there that they were not at all averse sometimes to poking around and also that's what I said earlier about having an inventory of the material being sent to you so you have some way of checking on it because we lost quite a bit of material early in the Game where all we got was the garbage part of it before it got to us why it had been thoroughly picked over and just disappeared and you know while we may be sober and so on and so forth some of us are not always as honest as we could be so so you know we have to take a little that into account you know there's a temptation there that you know you get an old book that somebody signed in and got a lot of names and various things in it and somebody adds it to their library and that tell us about your open houses we have two open houses a year in the archives the last one was about a month a month and a half ago and which we had And either 33 or 35 people dropped by to visit and sit around and talk and watch the, well it wasn't movies, but it was some of the programs that used the machine where it advances. and, you know, there are just small roll films at the end, like a slide did. But every time we have an open house, it seems like we're getting more. At first, I can remember three or four years ago when if we had ten people, why we thought we were lucky and we were quite amazed to have better than 30 at our last one and these are people who we have trouble getting them out of the building once they come in they are interested so and the word gets spread that way it really helps to have that type of party you might say a couple times a year because The word does get out, and we find each time we have it why we have more of an interest in just what we're doing. Al, do you pretty well follow the archives handbook as far as security and confidentiality is concerned? Yes, that we do. If it's something that's going out to where it may be possible that it might get out of bounds, you might say. Why, yes, we do. Do you have any outside people that want to get to the file? No, we haven't had too much of a problem along that line, no. We have what we do if it's somebody who is wanting stuff, we usually tell them, well, why don't you join us at our monthly meeting? then it can be discussed with the whole committee and all and determine just what they want it for and that type of thing so that we have at least some idea just what is their purpose is there anybody else got any question I might be believe it no if not why thanks for the written information too well we'll have that available we hope to start having some more meetings later on and we'll have more stuff to give out one of the things that Al mentioned is rather interesting is using books from outside sources and some people say why in the world do you have that in the archives it doesn't have a circle triangle on well you know we're talking about history and what developed in a if we did that we wouldn't be can't pay any attention to dr. Silkworth there or any of the any of the history that was outside of a it's if for historical purposes I'm of the opinion that that information is good to have available as long as it isn't false. You know, we have a lot of things. I've been doing some taping for the Stockton area of old-timers and actually started when I started the group history of our group, which I'm about ready to finish in, and I taped people like the sheriff and the medical director of San Joaquin General Hospital during the time that Project Faith was was put together I have tapes of Dr. Robert O'Brien who was the Alcoholism Services Director and Reverend Dan Lambert a non-alcoholic minister who was at Project 3 I interviewed a judge who was very supportive of the AA program there are others I don't have a list here it's part of our local AA history, very definitely not to the exclusion of course obviously, not to the exclusion of our old members, but how did the community influence us? And in the same way, we get this thing out here. We want to have how the community affected us and how we affected the community. We're talking about group histories a minute ago, and Mildred Fox had to leave and just about killed her, but her husband is in the hospital. He just had an operation yesterday and she had a sacrifice to get down here and all of a sudden she got a call she had to go back to Manteca I'd just like to very briefly, very quickly talk about group histories the CNCA blue book Al showed you there are some other yeah You get it back. Yeah, as a matter of fact, that Gabriel Heater We the People thing came out of that history. It's a super piece of work. There are some others who have done some good work as far as intergroup type things. Santa Clara County has a good one. If you really want to see something, this is called Our Stories Disclose. It's by the state of Washington. Alcoholics Anonymous. Locally we've had great contributions by the Lodi Light Group, the Brown Baggers. and several others who have put together group histories. We have a form that's in your handout there for group histories I'm almost sorry I did it because Al gave me some more information here that would be more appropriate, more useful we might revise that before we get it out to the groups so I don't want to give a short trip to group histories but I don' t want to take the time here and we're sorry that Mildred had to leave Mildred as you recall I mentioned already is my my buddy my opposite she's in district 31 I'm district 32 I'm going to skip a couple of things here in the interest of time and oh yeah I did want to mention something about about Mildren and I wanted her to talk about Russell Ball. Back there, you'll find two large boxes with that large binder there. It's a rather interesting story and I won't bore you with it too much but Russell was area chairman for some time and he was very interested in history and collecting historical items and he became ill and died and all of a sudden we realized that he had collected some very valuable information and it was gone. his family disappeared I discussed this one time at a district meeting and one of the people there said hey I know you know his son lives in this area and he said if he could do anything for a he would be glad to so I contacted him and eventually ran the material down in in Alabama Robertsdale Alabama well what do you do about that a hundred and some odd pounds of material and Robertson robertsdale alabama uh so i called his widow and um she is failing but she did recognize the the interest and i also talked to his young son who's a teenager and he was very interested in getting it to us well how do i get it there so i call our delegate from the alabamba area who contacted both secrets who has since become a very good friend of mine over the telephone in Panama City, Florida. And this is the length to which we go. Bo had something like a 300-mile each way trip to get to Robertsdale, picked up the material and mailed it to his son, Rusty, who was in Ripon. And last weekend, Bill and I went down to Rusty's house and Rusty was very reluctant to give up anything and as we do with working with old-timers and with families, we don't want to get pushy at all but we showed him to his satisfaction that it would be put to good use and we would certainly not keep anything or destroy anything that was of a personal nature and Rusty gladly gave it to us and we went through it and took out some of the personal stuff and I'm going to work with Bill and Alan and eventually, probably at Thanksgiving, deliver this down to Fresno to go into the archives after we make sure that we're not taking anything that is important to the family. And this brings up a point. There was a lot of letters that passed back and forth between myself and Rusty here in Ripon and Francis in Alabama and young John Jonathan and I think one of the things that impressed people more than anything else is we didn't do hardly anything without a very very appreciative thank-you note and I that's very important particularly with the families it brings up another point meeting the family site one of my bosses has been in AA for a short time and was going to San Francisco and he said, do you know one of the founders of the Tracy area groups? And I said, yeah, I've heard of them. And he said well his daughter is still living. They're still around and all of a sudden I realized that she's a dear old friend of mine from way back 15 years ago. Got together with her and she got with her nephew who's living in the old homestead and down in the basement there's a whole bunch of stuff including, I am told, the first edition. And we're going to be getting to Lina and see what we have and see if we can talk her out of it. She's quite amenable to it. Unfortunately... Unfortunately... Oh, who am I? Bill, what's the name I'm trying to think of in Tracy, the old-timer? Roy. Unfortunately, Roy was very generous and gave a lot of his material to a lot OF people and those people are still alive and they're reluctant to give it up but eventually I have faith eventually we'll get it okay alright one of the things I did have in mind is consider the tape My Name is Bill W the TV show what would have happened if we didn't have an accurate recording of the history of Bill W and Alcoholics Anonymous had they tried to put on that dramatization of real fact. It was pretty good, it was pretty Good. There were a couple of things people have said that weren't correct, but I don't think it did us any harm. I'll get an argument on some, I'm sure. Anyway, what I would like to do now is call on some of our current leaders and maybe they can give us an impression about not only what history has done for them, but also what it's done for them in their recovery program, but perhaps some assistance in our attempts to do what we're doing. Marge Kemp was supposed to be here, and she didn't make it, obviously. And the only thing I can say is I really appreciated Tim the other day at area committee meeting when Marge got up and we had a discussion of a change in policies and everybody was citing the reason it was that way in the first place and Marge got up and not to be argumentative but just said this is why we did it this way when we did this way and you be the judge of whether or not it's supposed to be changed and that's an important thing for the old timers I'd like to have Tim Martin come up here now he's got a lot of stuff here and I really don't know what he's going to say but Tim has always got a whole lot of good stuff to say how about it Tim? I'm Tim. I'm an alcoholic. I'm Rancho Cordova. I've had the pleasure for the last two years of representing California Northern Interior as a delegate, and I've learned a lot, but I'm not going to talk long because my junior over here, Jim, is going to tell, and I know precisely what he's going to say because I told him everything he knows so I'll make mine very brief I love all kinds of history and when I get a piece of it I share it this article here is from a transcription of a speech by Bill Wilson delivered in Fort Worth in 1954 how the big book was put together this is Bill talking and telling how he put the thing together That's a copy of it for everybody, I believe. And the central office made 1,300 copies of this and attached it to the, by the way, the first supplement they ever added. And I wonder who coaxed them to do that. I imagine it was Tim. And Frank Mouser gave that to us at the last conference. Frank Mouser is very generous with everything that he has in archives I first met him in 83 when I went back there to find out what they did and everything about it I could the first thing that I found when I walked into the office looking at everything most people go in that office and look at the pictures of everybody they sad to even post pictures and they look at the big red books they've got there and things of that nature well miss ruth and i went in and we spent two full days pulling out drawers and looking at everything and we'd sit at a table miss ruth hell i wouldn't be here today without her uh she would take notes of what we were looking at and one of the first things that i found i looked at like the county records office you pull up a book and open it up well then, up jumped this I was just getting ready just understanding the big book and here's what it was where does it say so? archives it tells an index of the alcoholic synonymous 12 and 12 AA comes of age and as Bill sees it every key sentence every key word it tells us what it is what book it's in what line it's on it stays by my telephone I got this in 83 Frank Mouser took it out of the archives had somebody take it apart and made me a copy of it right there of course a lot of people we've had it reduced and we had it at Big Book 7 off sale in 1983 I found out about the big book seminar and at the same time they had a unity and service and concept seminar at the sametime in one room there was 350 drunks talking about recovery and over here there was that 10% 35 to 50 people sitting there listening to the unity and service who was conducting the unity and service Neil Wee Frank Mouser Wesley Parrish Cora Louise Belkin from Mississippi David Aronofsky from Dallas, Texas and they talked about the history I've got in this series of tapes here the archivists and all of them talked about history of five of the different tapes and in this series I'll get a copy of it later that's the type of stuff that I go for It talks about AA, then and now. At the meeting we had in September, some youngster had been in the program six months, came up to me with his roll papers hanging out. It was print all over it. It was a dirty copy. And he says, Tim, somebody, I found this somewhere else. Somebody gave it to me or my family years ago. Well, I looked at it, and it said, What is the Oxford Group? and he says Tim you can take it and do what you want I said let me have this let me look it over so I looked at it and I read a little bit of it I said this is good stuff so I took it down to my printer and he pasted it and made it up into a lovely pamphlet and the name of it what is the Oxford group the layman with the notebook was a feature by L.W. Grinstead he was a professor a philosophy of the Christian religion at a university in well, the Oxford which started in London, England and this was printed by the Oxford University Press in 1933 and I've only read it once but I can go through it and when I was reading it I said, well my God, this is where Bill got this out of the big book. This is where the big book got this paragraph. This is where bill got his stuff that he put into the big book about the Oxford Group. It's all in here, and it's a jewel to read. And when you see me at these different functions, I'll have copies of all this stuff. I'm not in here to make any money. I don't make any funny off of it. Anything above the printing cost goes to the Big Book Seminar Fund. The Big Book seminar fund is delivered to three different outfits, general service, the central office and the area but I don't give anything to the area now because I'm on another committee after I get off the committee the area may get some if they change some of their damn attitudes that's a hell of a thing to say being the delegate of the area but if they don't believe in the big book they don' t get money but that's the type of work that I love and I've got all kinds of tapes and I got other stuff that I haven't gotten out I haven' t had time to do it but I'll be a feather duster after January and I'll have plenty of time to keep working exactly on the stuff that I'm doing now. Thank you. Thank you, Tim. Just looking at my notes here and I wanted to make a couple of remarks about working with old-timers. And we have two of our my dearest friends right here Lillian, and Paul Lillien is the co-founder of the studio group of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is over three decades old. And they very graciously allowed me to interview them and secure and make sure that none of their mementos are destroyed. Let me talk about that, though. Some people have gotten burned, and that's just the truth. Some people are given material up and then it ends up somewhere in a dumpster. Some are very open, and some are very willing to give up their materials or give a taped interview. We have guidelines in there for the taped interviews, and if we have time, George, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to say this. If we have Time, we'll get George up here to talk about oral histories. But anyway, stress the security and privacy of the material when you're talking to old-timers. Get their permission to use it. And the main thing we want to overcome is a natural thing. I've got two people in the room here, and I love them both dearly, and they say, one of these days, one of These Days I'll go into that drawer or into my garage or into that closet. one of these days I'll bring that stuff together and it's our job as archivists people on the archive committee to encourage them to do such if you're dealing with families of deceased members one has to be very careful to get their permission to use full names or whatever it's a good idea to interview in teams because of the fact that But sometimes it's a good idea to have the non-alcoholic spouse present. I was interviewing a gentleman the other day who was... Memory is failing, and we find that all over. Even mine gets pretty bad. Names didn't come up, dates didn't came up, and his wife was with him, and she was still pretty sharp, and she came up with all names, just the names, just the dates, and he did the talking. But it was really great because without that I would never have gotten names and dates. And that led me to a few other people. One other thing about dealing with old-timers is I don't think we're in the business of whitewashing. Certainly, we want to present AA in the best possible light to those who might come in the future. There's no problem. I have no problem with that. But as you read AA Comes of Age and some of the other books, you'll read about a lot of problems that happen. You know, you read about Hank and the redheaded Standard of New Jersey executive that got himself in trouble with, in some ways, with his trying to sell stock in the Works Publishing Company. And you read a lot about, a lot up in A comes of H, people who tried to do things and failed. You read about people who've tried to go public. The guy who wanted to go on national radio and he was finally informed that if he did that there would be several thousand AAs that would write to the sponsor and tell him that they were out of line and therefore he didn't. What I'm saying is we have to talk about problems. Bill Smith and I talk endlessly about AA and we talk about problems too, some of the things that happened in the past that were problems, mistakes that were made. We learn from our mistakes. And for the last thing when you're talking to old timers get other names either of the other old timERS or their families I just had a note pushed to me a minute ago by this next guy he said if you have don't call on me only if you've got enough time well I don't think anybody really has enough time to listen to this guy he's been around for a couple of hundred years former delegate former trustee for Alcoholics Anonymous and the author of a concept that he'll briefly touch on and that is the concept of perhaps a fourth legacy a legacy of experience I'd like to read you one quote that I think is before I introduce Jim although experience is certainly vital to all known organization it is veritably mandatory to the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous we believe that there's only one way our leaders can determine the proper course of action and that is to rely on experience experience must be available in a manner other than by word of mouth so let's uh let's get jim masterson up here to give us a little brief on what it's meant to him history is meant to him and maybe a little idea of what he's proposing well I still wish you had done what I said because I'm kind of an outsider here and I shouldn't be talking in this particular area but nevertheless I am and when I found out I was going to have to say something I've been scribbling over there on this piece of paper and now I can't read my notes which is probably just as well because that will cut down what I got to say I am Jim Masterson and I can't drink I never could then I came to AA and found I never had to so for 38 years I ain't that's about all I'm going to say about what happened to me I'm just going to reminisce just a little bit just a Little Bit here and I'll try to make it very short for me I'm glad they paid the tape I'm gladly paid the tape because it brought back so many memories to me of the different people that I saw on that tape and most of them I knew. Dr. Bob Natchell, I didn't know because he died the year before I came in. But all the rest of them on the tape there I have known and known very well. Not just to meet them. There's a lot of people who say, oh, I met Bill. I met Dr. T. Bold. I met Reverend Sam Shoemaker and so on. And what they did, they usually saw him from a stage and maybe they come back down and they say, I liked your talk and so forth. and this might sound to you like I'm trying to toot my own horn with what I've got to say here or I can come up with a theme for what I might say who cares really because it seems to me that this seems to be the pattern in many areas and I would hope that it changes in our area who in hell cares anyway what has happened in the past who cares what anybody was interested in who cares what they knew about the early days of AA and meeting the different people. And there is that kind of a general theme around here, and a lot of it is just built mainly on jealousy. I think Bill will agree with me on that, the jealousy that you hear, and they weren't. As a result of it, they say to hell with you. Who cares? And that might sound like sour grapes, but I think it's just kind of human reaction, for God's sake, every place. And I think this does take place when you're talking about the history of any particular area. There are certain people you're going to believe and certain people you won't, and those that you don't think you're gonna believe, you won' t ask them. That way you won''t have to have any arguments with them. But as a result, we lose out on a lot of the history within your particular area But I did have the opportunity of knowing Alburn Smith, for instance, sitting down talking to him hour after hour, just bowl session with Bill. Naturally, Nell Wing, of course, is still alive and I'm still in contact with her. In fact, she's called me five times from New York just since the first of the year and I just got a letter from her about two weeks ago, Tim. so I'm not going to say that I haven't had a little bit of contact with some of these people and seeing the pictures of the 1965 World Conference in Toronto the first picture was me standing behind the microphone I'm no longer I'm ashamed of that but that's somebody from the CNIA for Christ's sake standing up there and the other three people on that program that particular night was Bill and Lois and Marty Mann now these are you might say well you're trying to toot your own horn And that's not what I'm talking about. If something happened from this area, I think the people are entitled to know about it. If you want to leave the name out, that's all right too. But we've been very active in CNIA. In fact, there was a mention also, if you recall in there, about the momentous decision in 1965 actually didn't take place until 66 in reality on the ratio change. When we had the predominance of alcoholics over non-alcoholics this area has been involved in that for instance from 1957 whether you know it or not in 1957 we were the only area in a who stuck stuck with and didn't change their mind about the need for the racial change this is CNI a every other area in Sacramento or in a 80 finally voted against it and that's reason he didn't make that change in 1957 but CNI I didn't we stuck and we stuck right with it there's a lot of thing other things that have happened in AA that I would just love to talk about what we're talking about our archives here today mainly but I think that the experience of what happened is just as important as the if you want to call it the fact that this this person community at that time that group started here and certainly as As I was talking to Jim the other day, the events, the factual, if you want to call it history, is very, very important. But I think that's one reason a lot of times the newcomers don't get too interested in, you know, the history of AA. They say, well, why should I be so damn interested? And so and so started this group and then out of that group, this started off. If you read, I hate to say this, but if you read the Washington book, it was published by a very good friend of mine, Eric Bergman. But if you reading it, there is not too much in the way of experience in there. It's just a history and it's just exactly what it says. It's a history of when each group started, who started them, and what groups sprung off from those groups. but I told Eric here for a newcomer it's pretty damn dull reading and it is but it is a history it's there in printing so that anybody wants to go back and find out who was there and who wasn't where they started and so on it's all there but there's not too much in the way of experience there's also another thing I think that affects the gathering of material it should be an impetus but it isn't in gathering material about history whether it's in this particular area and so on I'm sure Bill, I don't pick on Bill we've been friends for a long time that we hear some of the most ungodly interpretations about how different groups started and how service got started and who was involved and what did they do we hear their personal I know that I have in my particular group I've heard the most ungodley interpretations how group 3 started for God's sake and I know Bill and I talked about this of how it started and how it operated and these people maybe they've got what maybe 10 or 15 or 20 years or something like that and I don't deprecate that length of sobriety at all I don'T mean that but they're just guessing that's all that they're doing instead of coming up with actually the way that it started and the way it operated and the problems they had and so on so this is one of the problems I think is is that sometimes people pretend they are experts but they ain't been there it's a good idea if you're going to find out about if you want to talk about the 40s or 50s or early 60 it's a good idea to have somebody was there at the time not somebody's interpretation of what they had heard and interpreted it themselves and put it on put it on tape or on paper what they think about what happened and and who started in for instance another thing that I was just thinking I'm talking a little bit faster I want to get this over in a hurry but is that that this month for instance, there are very few people that know this. How many of you have heard of Gratitude Month? That's strange because there isn't such a thing. No, I'm serious. I'm not trying to put anybody on the spot, but I see this in writing and in the headlines of different newsletters and so on. gratitude month there isn't such a thing it's tradition month is November November is tradition month as proclaimed by Bill now where do you think how many people have shut up Tim and Bill what do you where do you think here where do think gratitude week started who started it anybody to me you see I think this should go with this type of thing should go in the archives and history along, well, history and experience. That started right here in CNIA. Vic Maloney from Sacramento is the one who presented Gratitude Week. He presented at the conference and now all over the world, and I think the last count there was 32 foreign countries who celebrate Gratitute Week. And I don't know how many different states all over United States celebrate Grатitude Week And yet here in the CNI, where it started, not only don't we celebrate it, we don't even know what it is. We don't know where it's started. Now, as they say, that might sound like wet cloth, something like that. But these things are important, I think, if you're going to know the history, the history of CNIA or even within your district right here. because there's a lot of people I know that Bill could remember that nobody else could remember and the things that happened here in the beginning. So anyway, I like to think that, in fact, it's one of my big concerns and I'll get into this very briefly. It's one OF my big, big concerns that we don't have any documented history of experience and there's A difference between history, as I say, and experience. experience is what happened as a result of history. And God knows there's different changes that have been made in CNIA and AA all over the world. That experience was always taken into consideration by Bill before he died. And he died in 71. And before that, if we had trends, if we have trends, we have precedents set in AA. And that's a part of experience. That's a part of experience when trends are set or mistakes are made or errors are made and successes as well. Bill would write an article and put it in the grapevine or he'd give a talk at the conference and he would cover that present. However, in 1971, when Bill died, we lost our contact and we've had nobody. We've had no one since then. We've got nobody since that time to put on paper the experience from 1971 on up or basically from 1955 on up. And the lack of, I'm not going to say ignorance, but the lackof knowledge of what has happened in CNIA, just for instance, as well as AA as a whole, is just flabbergasting. I know that I asked some people from Fresno what they thought of our fifth delegate, and they didn't know who it was. And I have yet to find anybody who knew who it wasn't until I put it on paper. and I mentioned the word Bertha Williams and they say who was she well she was a delegate from just outside of Fresno I know Bill will remember she and Jack but nobody even knows who she is now maybe there's no problem in that but it seems to me that we should know who our delegates were in the time since 1951 on up I can go on and on with the different things that have happened in history or CNA and sometime I would like to put them on tape but you've got to ask the old timers before they can do it and if you don't have the opportunity if you want to put it on tape how in the hell are you going to do it I know that I had written a history of CNIA for years sent it back into the archives and they had it back in there but nobody in CNIA knew there was even a history of CNCA there's quite a story to that too but finally it was a couple of years ago it was printed but before that But before that, I kind of a skeleton, if you want to call it a skeleton history of CNIA and its activities. Before that, there was no history. And now we have it on paper. But very few people have not only haven't they read it, they have they don't even know that it exists any more than the history of, for instance, of in Sacramento. there's a lot of people who say I wonder why we can't have a history of Sacramento A the same as you want it in Stockton and Lodi and so on maybe it's available and you don't even know it maybe you haven't given anybody the chance to do it anyway as a result of this and I'll knock it off here Jim as a resultado about 10 years ago I realized and not just my idea because I talked with some of the other old timers too and particularly in Nell Wing but I didn't know that at the time that this experience, if you want to call it from 1971 on up, there's nobody who could recount all of the, what would you call it, the knowledge that had been gained out of our growth in AA, our tremendous growth and the deviations from the program and the successes and so on. And nobody was putting it on paper or on tape. And there's no place, you can't tell me any place that you can go that you kan get the benefit of experience that's happened all over the United States and Canada. I'll just confine it to that. There is no place you can go and get that kind of experience in writing or listening to it. So about 10 years ago, I come up with this idea of having a forced legacy of experience. And at that time, I sent it into Beth Coleman and GSO. And they had two staff meetings on it, and they were all excited about it. And I got a couple letters back from them. And then Bob Pearson, I'm going to use the name, Bob Pearson came back from vacation and was trashed. And that was it. Well, Nell Wing called me up 10 years before and she said, Jim, I want you to do me a favor. Don't drop it. And that means something to me. Anyway, Nell Wynn said, don't drop It, Jim. Don't Drop It. She says, I can't do it, but you can. Well, I got pretty disgusted and I said, to hell with it, period. If they don't want it back in GSO, okay, that's fine with me. I'll forget about it. But about a year ago, and this is what I think this whole meeting is all about, really. that the people with experience are slowly dying off. In fact, they're practically all gone. When you get back in the late 40s and the 50s and 60s and stop and think of the number of people who have passed on with that experience, it scares the hell out of me. I don't know whether it does out of you or not, but you can't make a tape of their remembrances of growth in this area if they're not alive. so about a year ago I thought oh my god there's very few of us left for God's sake in that area and we better start we better start accumulating the experience and make use of that experience because if you if the I've always said you can't blame the newcomers today and I don't think we can we can't blame the newcomers in today for making the wide changes that they're making in AA and believe me if you don't think there isn't problems in AA you just haven't been around paying too much attention we've got all kinds of problems but we if we don't give these people today the experience let's say from 1955 on up or 1971 on up we don t give them the experience how can we blame them for making mistakes you can't you they're entitled to have the benefit of the knowledge of the people who have gone before and if we dont give it to them then we gotta take the responsibility for the way it goes or folds, one or the other. And believe me, there's a lot of changes being made in Alcoholics Anonymous and its growth today. So I started to put this on paper again in almost exactly the same form as it was 10 years ago and I sent it in just to bring you up to date. I sent het in to New York. It has gone to the Archives Committee and there are very few people in CNIA who give a damn. Now that may be kind of strong words but that's true. But this has gone to the board meeting in July. It was accepted as a, what would you call it? Accepted, let's put it that way. It went to the Archives Committee. They got tied up with it. They appointed a definite committee for the development of the Forest Legacy of Experience. It went through the Policy Committee and then it went tothe board meeting. And now you understand this is all coming out of CNIA. And I got it from you people, your counterparts. But George Gordon, who is a Ph.D. from Fordham University, is the chairman of that committee. And they ask him what he thought about it, and he says, Ladies and gentlemen, what we're talking about here is the survival of AA as we know it today, so evidently it has some worth. Now Tim has seen a lot of the letters and knows of the phone calls that I've got from all over the United States. states. I'm talking about Texas, North Carolina, outside of New York, Canada, every place. And yet I've had really three people who are giving a damn about it in CNIA. Now you can say that's a wet blanket. But I just don't get any response. And that's kind of normal though. There's nothing wrong with that because when it's in your own area, don't give two hoops and hell about it. But it does look like it's going ahead. In fact, I haven't I had the report of the last board meeting in October, but I will probably in a few days and I'll give it to whoever wants to. Whoever wants to know what's going on. It is off the ground. And I think and of course, the archives are going to be the one who are is going to handle the mechanics, if you want to call it, of this. If you wantto call it the fourth layer of the experience, it's going to go through the archives. and simply because simply because we need the experience I'm just going to say from the late 40s and 50s on up there's a wealth of experience out there but most of it is passing away now the funny part kind of an omen at the time they were discussing this fourth legacy of experience which is a part of archives not the events I'm talking about the experience from the older members at exactly the same time on that Friday afternoon one of the smartest men in Alcoholics Anonymous he's a PhD from Michigan Jack Meagher he had a wealth of experience he was standing out in his front yard and he just had a heart attack and died and so George asked the board do any of you think that Jack Meigher had any experience to give to those up through the archives and they said certainly he had all kinds of experience that everybody should know. He said, we'll try to get it out of him. He's dead. Now that, I don't know, he just put the, which is like an omen. If we don't get it pretty soon, if we don'T get it on tape, it's going to be lost because once a person is dead, it's very hard to interview them. And I don'T want to be facetious about it, but that has been what has happened. And that is all a part of archives. And even myself, I would like to sit down and talk about these things that have happened since I've been in on tape and all they have to do is ask me I did when I started the archives committee however I did take absolutely every single thing I had plus my first big book all of the pictures was explanations of who those people were and where they were active in this group and that type of thing I sent absolutely everything that we've got plus the picture of me that's on the front and the back page of Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers I sent that picture to the archives too it's all in there I never didn't get a receipt for that, by the way. I wasn't the chairman. Oh, okay. But I just packed it in a box and sent it in, and I gave it to them. And the only thing I kept was my original plaque. So I believe in the archives, and I know that I've taken too long and rambled a little bit too much, but I think getting the experience from the old-timers on tape is just as important, and I didn't say more important, just as importante as getting the facts when this group started and that person started this group and then that group. So on those are, that is history. But an equal part of that is the experience that comes out of that history and those are the things that your new members are going to be interested in, the experience that came out of history. So thanks a lot for letting me ramble on here. I didn't mean to go that long. Okay. In your handouts there, there's an article that Jim wrote beginning in 1971 for the grapevine is called I Have a Reoccurring Nightmare. And, you know, I could never be in charge of anything. I have to have everybody tell me what to do. I better pass the basket because if I don't I'm going to be out a bunch of money before this day is out. And those of you who ordered tapes I have seven of them here so, Jim, do you want to take care of that? Hand those out they're right here and those are three bucks a piece gee I hate to keep talking about money we will we will cost about 20 bucks for coffee in addition to the the meal. Well, thank you, Jim. I've read a lot of Jim's stuff and it is really priceless. It really is. I read some of the letters that he has sent and some of the letters he has received regarding the concept of the Fourth Legacy and and it's really exciting. Okay, I'm out of order here, which is usual for me. Bill has left the room. I'd like to bring George up here for just a few minutes to talk about oral histories. I touched on it a little bit in talking about working with old-timers, but maybe he could give us just a couple of minutes or just a brief few minutes on oral histories What I'm talking about is taking a tape recorder like this or whatever and a microphone like this, which I happen to think is the most appropriate, sitting down and talking to people. And George, why don't you come up here and talk at us about it? George Farnsworth. Thank you, Jim. I'm George Farsworth, and I'm an alcoholic. Hi, George. Okay, I'll try to keep this real simple and real brief. My experience with doing oral history is that I was fortunate enough back in my junior college days to take the very first course offered at Columbia J.C. up by Sonora in oral history. At that time, there were only four places in the United States that an oral history course was given. And Columbia was one of them. And to give you an idea of what can happen when you do an oral history, there's a fellow that I chose as my subject to sit around the area up there for a very long period of time. I went in, I interviewed him, found out that he was a Harvard graduate. He came over at the turn of the century to a little town in Murphys, California and went to work as a ranch foreman for a lady that owned this rather large cattle ranch up there. Anyway, one thing led to another. I faced up the interview. I took it back to Columbia and they put it in the archives up there A few years later, Mr. Kenny passed away and some relatives came out from Boston where he was originally from and were going through the papers and they ran across a few notations that he had made that somebody had interviewed him. And my name came up. Well, my name didn't mean anything to them. So she happened to run into the local doctor up there. He knew me. The local doctor gave her my grandmother's phone number She calls up my grandmother. My grandmother calls me. I tell my grandmother where this stuff is. Anyway, the lady goes over to Columbia J.C., picks up a copy and sends it back to Boston. Come to find out, the Kenny family in Boston is somewhat famous and there is a museum dedicated to the family and their accomplishments. So you never know what's going to happen to that material that you're going to gain from whoever you're interviewing. Here we're rather limited, but that was an example. I've also done some family work on my own family. I did my grandmother and found out that my grandfather was a bootlegger here in town. I also did my grandfather on my father's side of the family and found out that he had had a run-in in his younger days with Pancho Villa down in Mexico. He came out of it alive, which he was quite lucky to do that. Basically, for the purposes of AA, I think when we go in and we're recording someone to get their experience, to get the history that they have knowledge of, that we have to be very careful that that knowledge is protected from someone who might use it to harm either AA or that person. That is going to be a big concern of people that are interviewed. If I sit down there and I speak into that tape as I would speak in a meeting amongst my friends in AA, I don't want that material to go out into the general public. There's a remote chance of that, but it is a small fair back there that could create a problem. this I'll throw out just for your hopeful interest and perhaps someone could come up with something better and it would be a simple statement at the beginning of the tape which would be something similar to this. This tape recording is a property of Alcoholics Anonymous and is not removed from the archives or copied unless authorized by the archive. We've got to have some kind of protection The person or persons on this request that anonymity be protected at all times. Also, any information taken from this tape by anyone must be reviewed and passed on by the archives. That way we can protect that person's anonymity. That, as we all know, is important to AA. Basic information that you would want to get on to that tape is obviously the date who the person is where the tape is being made what their dry date is what their exposure to AA was the age that they were when they began AA Jim somewhat covered the microphones placement of the mic that basically is as close as you could get it to the person that you're interviewing but yet they're not uncomfortable you definitely don't want to take a large microphone like that stick it right here underneath their chin the tapes of the right kind and type like we're using here these tapes are 62 minutes long and there of a commercial variety excuse me the guidelines for conducting oral histories in my class that I took we were instructed that the best way to do this was to use if at all possible a two stage interview the first interview is to go in and familiarize yourself with the subject that you're talking about with the person let them get to know you ask whatever questions and make notations that interview can be on tape then you go back for your second interview this is the one that's the real keeper the first interview allows the person that you are interviewing to get used to you to get used as a machine the second one they're going to be hopefully far more relaxed, far more comfortable. If they forgot things in the first interview then in the second interview perhaps they've had a chance to search through their minds talk to their friends and gain that information that they wanted to find. Basically the benefits are just as those that I described it's important that we give people time to think when we're interviewing we don't want to rush through this thing if we can only get a few minutes and perhaps the person freezes up okay go back again another time to tape an interview with most people is somewhat of a time-consuming and stressful thing for them in some cases if they're not used to speaking out on these particular topics. If I went to Bill Smith, I wouldn't have any problem. But if somebody came to me, I'd think, my God, what have I got to say? Your equipment should be of reasonably good quality. my personal preference is Sony but the Marantz over here is considered the Rolls Royce machines that can be used it's just basically to get a good clean recording watch out for the environment that you're in if you're sitting down in a squeaky table move to another table if you are sitting in a chair that squeaks or groans or whatever get into a different chair you've got to make that environment as quiet as possible because tape recorders pick everything up. There's nothing that they won't miss, especially if you use this microphone. It literally will pick up a pin dropping. But the basics of a good oral interview is to achieve familiarity between the parties that are all talking and to get a good comfort level in there so that it flows. You want it to be as natural as possible. The person that is doing the interviewing should try to stay off that tape. You're not the person being interviewed. Simple way to do that if you use the double interview process is you've already made your notations of your topics, you can hand that sheet of paper to the person that's being interviewed and they can use that as a memory jogger. That simplifies their have to worrying about chronological order and all of that sort of thing. Basically, Jim, just keep it real simple. I'm going to shut up and that's all I have to say. Thank you very much. Thank you, George. You know, I had a couple of thoughts. I was at a meeting, service meeting not too long ago and a young lady was there and I was asking for group histories and she said, well, we don't have any history. I said, what do you mean? She said, we're only two years old. It's like Jim was saying. You know, there is history there. Document it. Put it down. Write it down somewhere. You know? Thirty years from now they're going to be like Lillian. We're goingto be looking back at that young lady and say, you know, she was there in the very beginning. So as young as groups are that's not that they don't need a history another thing I want to comment on Jim's comments a person who chronicles history puts it down there's no one here that knows anything substantive by direct experience from perhaps the Washingtonians maybe there is around what I'm saying is the question is Jim, what right have you got to be talking about AA history because you weren't there that's true and that's me what Jim Masterson was saying a minute ago is that and I'm interpreting that's true, the historical facts and the experiences must come from the old timers who were there but once they're set down they can be set down by someone who hasn't been around for that long as long as they're accurately recorded and perhaps the best way is what Jim is suggesting and that is recorded literally tape recorded another thing we get a lot of interesting information I was musing with Bill a couple of days ago I did an interview recently and I was told that one of the old-timers in this group was one of The First 100. I wonder how many First 100 people there are. We do sometimes have to verify what we get. We have a conflict here with two people, like I say, two people here that I love very much about when our group started. And that's okay. And if there is a difference of opinion, It's all right to chronicle that difference of opinion in the history. But we, as people who put things down and Alan who puts things in the archives, some of it may be not the accurate information. But when we start setting out facts, you heard me this morning, you old-timers, you heard my voice. You heard me talking about the history of AA. I wonder how many mistakes I made. Tim pointed one out. I said the allergy of the body and the obsession of the mind. I said it the other way around. I said, The allergy of mind and the obsession of the Body. Anyway, you know, we need to check ourselves and make sure that we state the facts as correctly as they are. I don't... You know, we're going to wind this thing down a little early. I hope you've all had fun I have I was at a service meeting the other night like so many service meetings it lasted 61 minutes 55 minutes where it was an airing of resentments over what was going on and 6 minutes was doing business we've all experienced that but I hope today we've had a little fun and learned a little bit and we're not here to get into fights about things let me ask Bill Smith to come up here Bill is my as I've already said is my mentor I don't know where I'd be without him I was on a dry drunk early on in my sobriety and actually in a blackout went over to his place sat in his kitchen with he and and Virginia and Bill talked me out of it he's got a great deal of experience and service in this area and like to have bills share on the on that the experience in the organization and history and history of the organization service in this area if you haven't caught my last name it's Bill Smith and I'm an alcoholic and we are we are running out of time here and uh thanks jim he brought back some memories uh and and it's right uh people are dying off that uh we i did mention names i uh was going through some records and there was a letter 1972 22 names on there and i'm the only one alive from that 22 and uh we dropped names around here and there's a lot of people don't even know who they are anymore and uh i think this is fine one thing i got out of here today they are people that still believe like i do i believe in alcoholics anonymous i believe in home groups and i believe it was put together and it worked for me and i think it'll work for anybody if they wanted to work and you know they were talking about Bill W I don't know if it's mentioned to you that they closed the picture with Bill holding hands with somebody and that was taken back in the 50s we didn't start holding hands until somewhere in the 70s and of course now I've talked pointed that out to people and I'm a nitpicker so anyhow I enjoy being a nitpicker I enjoy being here and I enjoy him being here he's talking about teaching people a lot of things he's forgot what I taught him and he pays no damn attention to it and he would have saved himself a lot if he had a problem if he had to listen truly truly yeah thanks a lot truly truly let's praise him he's getting anxious I uh yeah Alan would you please come on up my name is still Alan doctor and I'm still an alcoholic you know Jim Masterson was talking about the importance of the records of experience in the archives files I got about a three inch thick file from Doc Campbell former delegate and I guess I must have about an inch and a half or so of Jim Mastersons stuff and forgot her name Marge Kemp I got caught a bit from Marge Kemp and that's it other than what I've gathered the last two years that I've got from Tim but I know I don't have everything from Tim but I have talked personally to the living delegates that are still here and I keep getting told later I'm going to will it to you one of these days you know I can fertilize my lawn with that stuff And it sure doesn't do the archives any good. You know, I don't know what to do. You know? I talk to the people and they say, oh yeah, yeah, it's important. I say, good. Can I meet you? Well, someday. Gee whiz, you know? And on a personal note, he reminded me of something. Two years ago my son died from this disease. He died of alcoholism and a BCP overdose. He and my older daughter fought like cats and dogs. My daughter is now a member of AA. And she wrote a poem to him about three months after he died, entitled One Day, telling him all the things that she wished she had told him. And that's exactly what happens to the folks around here. We're going to die, damn it. And if we don't have the stuff before we die, we ain't never going to get it. Thank you. Thank you, Alan. You know, let's look at our primary purpose in trying to carry the message to another alcoholic. And that activity, that effort dies when we die. We can no longer carry it personally. You know we're not invincible no matter how young or old. March 15th of this year I had a heart attack. And I thought I'd had it. I thought it was the big one. They took me to the hospital and brought me around, and now I carry nitroglycerin. And I said, well, that's, you know, jeez, I'm only 56. I'm still a young man. It can't happen. I'm not sure. You know, here, and I'm saying, I'm nicht sicher, ich habe nichts zu sagen. I don't want to contribute to history. But isn't it true that we all do in some way or another? just a couple of random thoughts Bill was talking about yeah I know Bill thank you Bill was talking about holding hands at the end of the meeting in the story my name is Bill W there was a question that came up recently about the Lord's Prayer and why we say the Lord'S Prayer isn't it religious isn't a Christian in our meetings and there is a letter from Bill W and I don't have I don't have the first page of it that explains adequately that. And that will be available in the archives as soon as I get back one of the copies that I gave to Bill or one of these other people and make a copy and give it to... I got that from Florida, by the way. Anyway, I appreciate your all coming. My goodness, you know. As you can see, I'll never run a conference or anything because I'm so disjointed and disorganized. And if I didn't have two or three people around here telling me what to do, I wouldn't be able to do anything did everybody get the tape that they wanted okay okay alright okay how about let's is there anybody has any more to offer jeez that's terrible does anybody have any more to offer Paul Lillian alright yeah Paul how about getting this idea when they say the Lord's Prayer and say whose father whose father I don't like that I don' t either thank you Paul let's let's close the meeting in the usual manner with the Lord's Prayer or as Bill said in his letter for those who wish well everybody got a hand Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever amen keep coming back it works thanks for coming folks before we break up