The Hard Times That Birthed the Fellowship – Gail L.

My name is Gail, and I'm a grateful alcoholic. Hi, everyone. I want to begin by thanking my host, who just walked in, Suzanne. Thank you for your hospitality. Thank you, Gunnar, for picking me up from the airport. Ivaleta, thank you so much for coordinating so many plans, and Marie, for all your thoughtfulness, knowing that I'm a history lover, which you're going to find out in a minute, and all the Andreases that helped hook everything up. You've got some smart boys here in Sweden. I had a little trouble in Scotland, so I appreciate that you were able to do this. Well, I'm going to begin because I want to make sure we have enough time for this talk. And as I told you, I am an alcoholic, but I am going to prove it because a picture is worth a thousand words. Now, I would like to tell you that this is Woodstock. It's not. I was on a camping trip. If you notice to the right is about a half gallon of wine. and I was a winette. To the left is a can of beer. I think there's a pack of cigarettes there and a cigarette in my hand, and my zipper is not down. That's just the way those pants were. So I think that's a pretty good qualifying picture. And by the way, my sobriety date is May 13th, 1978. I found my way into this wonderful program. Thank you. And I was lucky enough to sober up in Akron, Ohio. And so I hope I can bring Akron Ohio to Sweden. That's my job today. Now here's another picture of me. That's a picture of me in a blackout. Think you can relate? Well when I came into Alcoholics Anonymous in Akroon, Ohio they told me to say Whenever AA asks you to do something, say yes. You might have heard that here as well. And that's what has actually led me all the way to this moment here with you tonight. And I happen to have said yes to someone who asked me to seat Lois Wilson at Founders Day after Bill died. Lois continued to come back and visit us each year, and we honor that on June 10th, Dr. Bob's last drink. And so we'll have 12,000 people here this June. And we have a big party. So I was seating Lois and I was going to seat her companions down in front of her. And I met this beautiful woman here. This is Nell Wing. Nell wing was secretary to Bill Wilson. And Bill saw that this program could get distorted, could become myth. So he asked her if she would keep the history, and she eventually became an archivist, our very first archivists at headquarters. So I was talking to her, and I said, now, if there's ever anything I can do for you, well, just ask. Don't ever say that in Alcoholics Anonymous. She said, well yes, Gail, there is. I'd like you to start an archives. I didn't know what an archives was. I thought it was some smelly old paper somewhere. until I came to this country. I've spent a good day and a half enjoying your history that's hundreds and hundreds of years old. And tonight, I'm going to bring you history that's just a little over almost 75 years old, but it's traveled quite far since its birth in Akron. so I want to tell you just a little bit about Nell she was like a Wilson if you go to the Wilson house actually Nell's room is there at Stepping Stones and was a constant companion to Bill and Lois so when she asked me to do that I didn't know how am I going to do this Akron didn't care about its history we hadn't done anything in half a century And so I got involved in the purchase of Dr. Bob's home. In fact, I negotiated the purchase on the home. And I thought, okay, I've done it. I have a place for the archives now. We can put it in there. So I took off and went to New York to stay with Nell. I stayed with her for about 10 days, and I visited Lois to learn how to do archives. And Nell said, well, Gail, if you want to be an AA archivist, AA can't own property. And I started doing what alcoholics do when they don't hear what they want to hear. I started whining. Whining is anger coming through a very small hole. And I tried to talk Nell Wing out of our traditions the next three days. So here I am on a visit to Stepping Stones. This is Bill and Lois' home in Westchester County, New York, with the lovely gardens. and there's Nell. I took a picture of her while I was there and you can see the beautiful interior. Lois Wilson was an interior decorator. And here I am having a drink with Lois Wilson. Now, I know you don't recognize me in that picture. You see, I was sober in that picture but my hair hadn't sobered up yet. It's still kind of unmanageable. Stockholm weather got a hold of it last night. But anyway, it was a sweet visit. And I left to go back to Akron and I broke away from the house and to try to set it up under the structure of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's what I'm going to tell you about now. Now, I'm a retired school teacher. So if you don't mind, I'd like to take you on a field trip to our office first so you know when you come to Akon. And i'm inviting you all now to please come. You've showed me a wonderful time here. And I would like to do the same for you if you were to make it to the year 2010, to Dallas. I mean, not Dallas, San Antone, Texas, where we are going to celebrate AA together. You know, we're all just one family, the one circle of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's how I feel when I come to meet you. You're just my brothers and sisters in AA. And so the office, We were getting mixed up with 855 Ardmore, which is Dr. Bob's home. So we took this large picture window, and it took us about a year to do. We cut it into about 1,000 pieces of glass. If you had come in, you would have cut a piece of glass and become a part of the window. Or you might have thrown us a sobriety coin. We are men and women who normally would not mix, and that window is surrounded with sobriery coins of various members that came through. And then we framed it with what I'm going to be talking about a little bit tonight, and that's called The Four Absolutes. They would not have taken. This is a symbolic picture. And the gentleman on the bed is symbolically Bill D., who was the third member of Alcoholics Anonymous. And when he got sober, he walked out of City Hospital on July 4th of 1935, a free man to never drink again. And that's when group number one began. And in your big book, you'll see that in his story. Bill makes a comment. So we're not the only one over in America celebrating the Fourth of July. You can celebrate with us because it's our Independence Day as well. I call this Embassy Row. The big book just turned 70 in April, and we're going to talk about that book tonight. It's a great history book, and we'll be talking about it. But it's in many languages now. It's in, I believe, 58 languages. It is in nearly 160 countries. And if you should come in for a visit, please look for your big book because we lift that plastic up and you sign it. And these books are becoming archival as well. Right there on the end of the left is a poster that was given to me by France, a group in France. It was signed by the first AAs in Russia. And we recently had one of those AAs visit the office and see that poster. Also, well, we're not in the UK, but there was some tartans. Are you aware that there was tartans commissioned for recovery? They wear ties and things in Scotland and stuff. So there's actually three tartans that have been commissioned that are there as well. Pretty cool, huh? Now, I'm a retired school teachers. So I have 26 displays from A to Z. And if I'm not there, you can put some headsets on and you can walk around. And we're redoing these. So by the time of the international year, we're going to have them really special. So that's the outside. And the whole history of AA is portrayed there. And then if you go to the inside, there's Reverend Tunks' chest. That's the man Bill called. It's filled with AA books. There's the magazines. And you can take them down and read them, and I'll tell you more about those in my story tonight. The one bookcase to the left is filled with big books, including the ones that influenced Bill on the writing of the big book. So that's the interior room, and we'll open the safe and show you some very special things. So if you come, I know many of you are coming. I know some of you aren't going to New York, and you're renting a car. It's only 10 hours from New York. And there's many, many things to see when you come to Akron. And I'm going to whet your appetite. This is a gallery. Some artists have been doing some paintings that have brought some of the scenic things to life for us, so it's there. And then finally, no archives would be complete without conservation. And it's their... We want this to be here for the next generation. Paper dies, so we are cleaning it, repairing it, deacidifying it, encapsulating it, and taking care of it for you because this is your archives. If you don't have a first edition, first printing big book, come and see yours at our office. It's a we deal. Also, if it's pretty far away for you to visit, you can go to akronaa.org. Some of you may know about the book Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers. We're trying to keep those voices alive, and we're putting on MP3 files, and you can directly download them off of our web page. And for those of you that would like definitions of the steps and the traditions. You can click on any of the words and little definitions will pop up and more will be revealed because we're always adding things, so please visit. And well, let's start on our story. That took me about six weeks to learn to do that. I wanna ask you to go back in time a little bit to Akron. Now, a lot of our story is going to take place during depression times. And our co-founders thought that was providential because this is a fellowship and it brought people together. The hard times caused them to have to work harder to help each other. I don't know if it could happen in good times if we could have birthed this thing. Akron was the rubber capital of the world and we didn't have royalty like you have here. What we had was the Industrial Revolution that produced a lot of money for some families. The family you're looking at here is from the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company. This is Harvey Firestone's family. Harvey is here in the center. And the son to the right of him is Russell, and his nickname was Bud. And he was a terrible alcoholic. And, you know, money can't buy sobriety. They tried. They sent him away to treatment. They did all the family could do with all the power, prestige, and wealth this family had. They could not help this young man get sober, so they gave up. It's like all the king's horses and all the kings' men couldn't put Bud back together again. Well, this man here on the left, his name is Jim Newton, and he's my favorite. He's just my favorite guy. Now, you might already know this But God can use womanizers in our story He's a young luggage salesman And he's chasing pretty girls in Massachusetts And he thinks he's on his way to a singles dance And he follows them into the hotel And he ends up in an Oxford group meeting And after that you're probably all familiar with a man by the name of thomas edison well he ends up working for thomas addison down in fort myers florida and next to thomas addison is henry ford and charles lindbergh is one of those guys down there and harvey firestone And they would all get together down there. Well, Harvey Firestone likes Jim, and he's going to invite him to Akron and get him a good position with the company. Thank God you don't sit here tonight. Well, Jim Newton takes the son on a train trip to Denver where the Oxford group was meeting. And on the way there, they nursed the bottle, controlled drinking. This is before Al-Anon. And on The Way Back, a man by the name of Sam Shoemaker was on that train. Now some of you might nod because I hope you know who Sam Shoemarker is. Small world. They put him in a train car coming back and he made a surrender in that train car. And he gave his life and his will like we do in The Third Step. and when he got off the train, he didn't look the same. Lines on his forehead were gone. The family looked at him. This was a new man. And if you're familiar with the prodigal son, when the son comes home, the father is so overjoyed. What does the father do? The father throws a dinner for all his friends. And he invites the Oxford group to Akron. Now, the Oxford group was for the down and uppers. If you were down and out, you went to the Salvation Army. So this was society times. It was who knew who. And you can see that our society got all dressed up and came out to meet the Oxford Group. Now,the Oxford Group traveled like an army for God. They were what originally was a return to first-century Christianity. Later, they became the Oxford Grup, And then they became Moral Rearmament, MRA, when Buckman had a spiritual experience, another conversion experience in the Black Forest in Germany. And they changed their name and they were going to change the world one leader at a time. And today they're known as Initiatives of Change. Do you ever hear of Up, Up with People? They used to travel up, up with people. Did you ever heard that group? Do you know that they broke off from the Oxford Group just like us in the 60s? I thought that might be interesting because I think they traveled around a lot. So the newspapers pick it up because Frank Bookman's coming to town with anywhere from 40 or 60 of the group. And Mr. Firestone's going to put them up, they're going to have the dinner, and his son is going to give testimony to his recovery from alcoholism. You see, this is how the Oxford group came to Akron. This is how The Story gets started. And it's important. It gets started with the drunks' recovery. That's not what's going to happen in New York. But in Akron, it gets started with the drunk's recovery and Henrietta Seiberling attended because for the next 10 days they're going to have house parties and they're gonna have meetings in the morning and at night for the last 10 days. For the next ten days and they'll go out into the pulpits of the churches. Well, Ann Smith, this is Dr. Bob's wife here, began attending. Now these two women they had a way of manipulating poor Dr. Bob. You know, he started out okay in Akron but eventually his alcoholism increases and he doesn't have too many friends left. So by the time he joins the Oxford group he's grateful to have these friends and he likes the people much like when you walk into a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous today. They were comfortable with themselves they were laughing and they were of good spirit. but dr bob and ann smith are going to be in the oxford group for two and a half years now it's going tobe the same principles that we get sober on today i mean they read lots of books dr bob read the bible a couple times he read all the books he prayed even went back to church he did everything the oxfor group told him to do and he did not get sober in two and a half years. That's an important point because there's a reason why. So this is Henrietta, a woman by the name of Delphine Weber calls Henrietta and says, what are we going to do about Dr. Bob? She goes, what do you mean, what we're going to do about Dr Bob? Well, he's a terrible drinker. He's about ready to lose his practice. He about ready to lose his home. And she did what they did in the early days of the Oxford group and AA, they would get up in the morning and they would open the Bible or a spiritual inspirational book and they Would read it. And then they would stop and they WOULD go into the listening part, listen to what God had to say for them. And Then they Would get a sheet of paper and a pencil or a pen, and they would begin writing what they thought God was saying to them. Then there was another part that they did. It was called checking. You never went it alone any more than you should in AA, I suppose. But they did this thing called checking, and then you would check it through the four absolutes, honesty, purity, unselfishness, and love to make sure that guidance wasn't coming from your ego. That guidance is one of the reasons why I think we have the program today. So many people were listening. By the way, your 24-hour book, how many people know about the 24-Hour Book? Not a whole lot? That came from two listeners from the Oxford group, just two women who listened and then a drunk came along and made it into a book for us. So anyway, Henrietta comes up through her guidance and she calls her friends T. Henry and Clarice Williams. Now, T. Harry looked like a drunk but he wasn't. who was actually a tire mold inventor. Bill Wilson comes to town, and he loses his job because of Bill Wilson in the proxy takeover fight at his company because it was National Rubber Company, and He was the inventor there. And they had this beautiful home, and they almost lost their home. Yeah, he's lost his job. He almost loses his home because they were foreclosing on homes, much like they're doing today in the United States. People can't pay their mortgages. and the bank stopped short of taking this house because they'd already taken so many, they couldn't take any more. So Henrietta asked them if we could use the house for a special meeting for Dr. Bob and Ann because they weren't sharing. And they agreed. And so Henrietta set up the meeting and she said, it was on Monday. The first meeting was what they called a setup meeting. Now you call, we call when we speak a lead Because from the Oxford group, there was always a leader. And when you speak in AA in our country, we call it a lead. Well, she was the leader of this, and she said, You come to mean business, there's not going to be any pussy footing around. We're going to share, and we're goingto share deeply. Sounds like intervention, doesn't it? For some of you that might know what an intervention is. Now, she got that from her guidance. So they planned the meeting for Wednesday at 8 o'clock. and um i don't know what they said they all went around the room and they shared and i don'T know those were down-and-uppers what did they do touch the stove and say some four-letter word i DON'T KNOW but when it came dr bob's turn there was this long pause and he thanked them and then he said now there's something that i want to share with you i am a secret drinker and i cannot oh he said at the cost of my profession, he was a doctor, I am a secret drinker and I cannot stop. Step one. Would you like us to pray for you, Bob? Yes, I would. They all get down on their knees in this home. That's what they prayed back then. They'd all get out of bed. Get down on your knees and they prayed for Dr. Bob. Now Henrietta would continue to pray for him for the next couple of weeks. It's not going to be long before something happens here, but she will continue to pray for him in her morning quiet time. Well, Bill Wilson, as you know, comes to town and the deal falls through and he is left in the lobby of the Mayflower Hotel that you see here. And he's pacing the lobby and he hears the tinkling of the glasses and he thinks he's going to go in and have a drink or strike up a conversation when he remembers something Lois said to him. You see, he'd been working with alcoholics for months before he came to Akron and not one got sober. And he was pretty depressed about that. But Lois said, but you're sober, Bill. So thank God he walks over to the telephone. He puts a nickel in the phone. Oh, before he does, he looks at the directory and he finds the most perfect name he can find. Reverend Tunks, when Bill went for a walk, he took a tonk. That's an old Vermont term that he used. You know, thank God he picked that name or we might not be here tonight because this is the only name he picks and it's the Firestone minister that had brought the Oxford group to town. So when he's looking for the Oxford group and he needs help, Reverend Tunks will give him 10 numbers. Thank God nobody was home. We might not be here tonight. People are busy. They're not home. And he finally gets a hold of one man, the last number, and it's Norm Shepard. And Norm ShEPARD gives him Henrietta Cyberling's number. Whoa, Bill doesn't want to call a cyberling. That's probably the president's wife. He doesn't, that's what he thinks. So he walks away from the phone. He's not going to call her. And then he hears that voice of guidance. He says, I heard a voice say to me, you better call that lady. He turns around and he goes back upstairs and he calls her slender threads. Now, Henrietta Seiberling was very proper. She was raised at Vassar to marry a Vanderbilt, But she had ended up marrying a cyberling. Now, I want to remind you, this is high society times back in the 30s. And it's going to be Mother's Day weekend. What a great gift we got for all the moms, huh? He's going call her, though, on a Saturday. And when he calls her, he says, I'm a rum hound from New York. Can you imagine saying that to her? Total stranger. I'm going to rum hounds in New York and I'm looking for another alcoholic. Because of her faith, because of her morning prayers, She thinks, mana from heaven. You come over here right now. I've got just the man for you. Well, that man, you know, was drunk. So the next day she says, if you'll go to church with me, we'll try to do it the next day. And Bill did that. Now I want to, um, and as you know dr. Bob didn't want to meet with him. I'm going to give that bird 15 minutes and bill looks at him and says, it looks like you could use a drink. And then two of them go back and retire into that little library right here is where they met. And if you come to Akron, you can visit there. Same wallpaper, same everything. And, you know, they talked late into the night. Two real quick stories I just feel like I want to tell you. One is when I told the story about Delphine Weber, the woman who called Henrietta. I did it at the 50th anniversary of group number one. A gentleman came from the back of the room crying. He came up to me and he said, Delphine, Delphing Weber, that's my grandmother. I didn't know my grandmother had anything to do with the start of AA. Then a woman comes into the program, Ethel Macy, and she saw F.A. Cyberling's limousine driver who drove Bill home that night, Bill back to the Mayflower shortly after that had come into the program and little did he know that night when he drove Bill back from the Gate Lodge that man would be starting a program that would save his life. So we never know what we're doing today is a link in a chain of events called Alcoholics Anonymous. I have many, many stories like that I could tell you because I've met the offspring of all the pioneers and many of their children and grandchildren to this day need the program. So something you're doing today is going to help somebody downstream. So this is the man on the bed we talked about. And, you know, Bob didn't have too much sobriety when they called on him, but they knew they needed to work with another drunk. I want to tell you a little bit about the four absolutes that they took to him. You see the words there. These are the only yardsticks we had in Akron. We didn't Have 12 Steps. These arethe four words that we got from the Oxford group that is what we used. We still study these today in Akron and the area. There are four questions that go with those four words. Is what I'm about to think, say, or do right or wrong? True or false? Ugly or beautiful? And how does it help the other guy? Now, those were real powerful tools. What happened, though, with the Oxford group is that when they started going country to country, they wanted to convert Hitler. and a telegram got intercepted that said god bless a man like adolf hitler or whatever but the real intent was to try to if they could get him they could turn the whole thing around but instead it caused so much controversy that bill who was trying to take care of this new little group backed away and you will not it's in the they're in the big book but he's kind of got them woven through. But we'll talk more about how important the Oxford group really was. So after that prayer, this house here, remember I said they said a prayer Wednesday at eight o'clock at the meeting here? They will continue to meet in this home until late 39. This is what we call the flying blind period. We didn't have conference approved literature. The big book wasn't conference approved. Um, we had this fly. We were just hanging on to the Oxford group. And what would happen here? Um, uh, is that a little squad of drunks began to form and it was called the alcoholic squad. And it was like a subgroup to the Oxford group. I mean, the Oxford Group was there, but these drunks were coming in and they were kind of taken over because, you know, for us, it's life and death. So we were kind of out even outgrowing these guys. Well, you Know the guidance part I told you about? Well, those drunks were pretty serious, low bottom drunks, and they were Jones and man, they were shaken. And they couldn't sit still for the guidance. So Dr. Bob would take them upstairs into the upper room, and they'd have their own prayer meeting. Now, the reason today that some of us use the Lord's prayers because in the Oxford group, we opened with a prayer. You gave some testimony and you closed with the prayer. And then you had a little literature on the table. We read the Oxford group literature and then we went and got donuts. So now we're going to go to, there's two places that this story takes place in. One of them is Akron. And now we are going to go to the other stage which is New York. This is Calvary Church. This is Sam Shoemaker's church. Uh, the Oxford group headquarters is there in New York. This is where Roland Hazard, when he comes back from seeing Carl Jung and Switzerland, this is where he will get three months of sobriety. Um, this Is where Abby Thatcher will come and he will get a couple months of sobriety and make a call on bill. Um So this is very important to us. This church, that's Sam Shoemaker. Bill would say that we got some of the steps from him because Sam often spoke of the same principles. We read a lot of his books, and this is where they held the Oxford group. Let's go in and see what a meeting there was like. That is a typical picture of when Bill and Lois were attending the Oxford Group there. Now after Bill gets sober in town's hospital, he gets this idea of primary purpose. When you read his story, he said, and I saw how my experience could benefit others. So Bill, Oxford group wanted to be all things to all people. Bill just wanted to help a drunk. So when he came in, he just about knock you over looking for a drunk Oxford group didn't like that too much. So they started giving Bill and Lois the cold shoulder. They, they didn't Like them at all doing that. So that's Clinton. And that's an artist's rendition of Clinton Street. This is Bill and Lois' home. And they start inviting the drunks back to their home. This is 1937 this is happening. And you can see they're greeting him there. And these form a group called the Drunk Squad. So you've got the alcoholic squad in Akron, and you've go this drunk squad in New York. Well, one minute Bill's a millionaire, and the next minute he's broke. Have you ever seen Bill? You can tell he's got emotional disorder. He's up, he's down, he' s up, h e' s down. Well, he is making a comeback and he is coming back to Akron and he's on a business trip. Things have been pretty slow going and he' is going to stop in to see the Smiths. This is 855 Bardmore. This is Dr. Bob's home and there are going to be a lot of failures. I don't know if you understand how hard this program was to get going because people were just falling off the wagon. Somebody would get a little time, and it was a lot of failures, and they didn't really know what they had. So they're sitting around the house. By the way, that's photoshopped in. Can you tell? I just wanted you to know that the three of them got together, and they started counting noses. That should say 1937. And they began counting, and they came up with 40 people sober. And this feeling came over the three of them. It was like a moment of ecstasy. And then they bowed their heads in gratitude because they realized that a light had come into the dark world of the alcoholic. It's the first time it dawns on them this thing might be catching on. Well, if you know Bill, the next moment, that humble moment turns into, hey, he's been working on Wall Street, why don't we get his chain of hospitals and, hey, we need some missionaries and, oh, we better get some literature to keep this message from getting garbled. I mean, that's where he went straight. You know, poor Dr. Bob, you know, he's like, whoop, what happened here? And, well, you know, the two of them were best friends. They were both Vermonters. And they always got along, but that doesn't mean they always agreed. They agreed to disagree agreeably, thank God. I think that was so important to getting this thing off the ground. Imagine if they were fighting all the time. I mean, I don't know if we'd have made it either. So Smitty, Dr. Bob's son, said if it was up to Dr. Bob, AA would have never left Akron. But if it was up Bill, he'd have franchised it. So here you can see the two co-founders. It's a very touching video. I think it's the only one we actually have. In a little bit, you'll see Ann Smith, the mother of AA. And what they did, and you can see the wild ties of Dr. Bob. He was pretty, that and Argyle socks. And they were both funny. You know, they both had great senses of humor as I think you can tell there. Pretty happy in their sobriety. Now Ann Smith was kind of more shy. She's going to be uncomfortable when she comes on here. There she is. Get me out of here, Bob. Come on. Just stay in the background. But she was sweet and everyone loved her. And she certainly earned her title mother of AA. Well, Bob wasn't too keen on the idea. He just wasn't quite sure. And they had come up with the idea of a group conscience. Once before that, Bill had been offered a job at Towns Hospital. And he got pretty excited. they were hungry. They weren't eating. Bob wasn't working, and Lois was supporting all the drunks. Bill was running around being a missionary. He wasn't workin'. And so when he got offered this job, he was so excited, but he came back and they said, Bill, you can't make this into a profession. You can't take that job at Towns Hospital. So this time they decided to try the group conscience again. And they went over to the house. They had 19 men sober at that time, good and true, they said. There's the living room where they said the prayer. And this is where they're going to hold this group conscience meeting. And there's Bill there. He's going to pitch it. He's quite the salesman, you know. Need a chain of hospitals? We're going to need those paid missionaries and literature to keep the message from getting garbled. Well, the alcoholic squad says the man of Galilee had no press agents, newspaper, pamphlets or books. Keep it simple, Bill. Bill said you can keep it so simple you'll have anarchy. He said there's alcoholics dying within gunshot of here. So they took it to a vote and with one vote over, they sent Bill back. They said, Bill, if you're going to do this thing, you go raise the money. So he went back to the Big Apple and he began to pitch to the rich. But you know what? The rich weren't too impressed. Forty drunk, sober, that's not a very big deal, is it? We'd rather give our money to the Red Cross or the Salvation Army. Well, some of you might know that Bill was subject to depressions and he'd get these imaginary ulcers. So he was at Clinton Street and he got one of those. Well thank God his sister Dorothy had married a doctor. So He trots off to the doctor, Leonard Strong. Leonard Strong's going to become a trustee in later years But at this time, he's a doctor and Bill goes doing that whining thing again. Those rich people won't give me any money. And Leonard says, you know, I think I know somebody who was once related to the Rockefellers. And he makes a phone call. And to Reverend Willard Richardson, he couldn't have picked a better guy. This guy is Rockefeller's spiritual advisor and best friend. Now, can you imagine Bill's going from an ulcer to the 54th floor of the Rockefeller building? I mean, this is Bill's life. It just, you know, it's those slender threads I'm talking about. In fact, he says on what slender thread our destiny does lie. And he meets with Willard and Willard arranges a special meeting in December of that year. in the boardroom of the Rockefellers. In fact, Bill sat in a chair that had just been vacated by J.D. himself. And he thought, ooh, I'm getting close to the money. He was so excited when he sat in that chair. Well, let's look at who was there. We have Albert Scott, Willard Richardson, Leonard, Dr. Silkworth, Frank Amos, and Leroy Chipman were there. The alcoholics that were there were Bill Wilson, Dr. Bob, Hank P., Fitz M., Ned P., and Dick S. from Akron. And they don't know what to do. They're so uncomfortable. They're sitting in the room. I mean, these are just low-bottom drunks that are cleaned up a little bit and they're sitting In the Rockefeller office. And they Don't Know What To Do. And they look at each other and they say, Why don't we just tell our stories? So they started to tell their story. And in the middle of it, Albert Scott goes, why, this is first century Christianity. Interesting, isn't it? After I just told you that's what the Oxford group was. So the next thing, and, you know, now remember, they want money. They're hungry. They're looking for money. Gentlemen, up to this point, this has been the work of goodwill only. No plan, no property, no paid people. just one carrying the good news to the next. Isn't that true? So Frank Amos was from Ohio, and he said, look, I'm going to go check. Oh, so they didn't get the money. Then they start saying, well, we really need some money. You know, we're, we wirklich need to get this thing going. So Frank Aimos comes to Akron and he checks us out and he sees that Dr. Bob's a pretty good doctor and he could probably do the job. And he writes a report that goes back for $50,000 and they're going to pay off the mortgage of Dr. Bob's home so he doesn't lose it. They're going start a rehab place. They're gonna put Dr. Bob in charge, subsidize a few people, start a chain of hospitals and get busy on that book. Well, the paper goes from Richardson to Rockefeller and it gets held up because he says, Somehow I am strangely stirred by all this. Please go back. But this interests me immensely. Let me do that again so you can see that. Oh, I think I had it automatically, so I'll have to be real quick. But isn't money going to ruin this thing? I think the thing that interests me the most about that statement is that he's strangely stirred by all of this. I wonder who's up there strangely stirring him. He says, no, I want to hear what goes on, but please don't bother me for any more money. No, I won't be the one to spoil this thing with money. Thank God. And the $50,000 gets shrunk to $5,000 and they take the $5.000 and they use $3,000 of it to pay off the mortgage at Dr. Bob's house And that's going to leave the boys $2,000 that they're going to pinch from in the coming months. It's an unbelievable story, isn't it? They're going put the money in the Riverside Church. This is the Rockefeller Church. Fosdick is the head of that church and they'll read a lot of books by him and he is going to write the first big book review that will appear in the New York Times. Then they're gonna borrow an attorney from the Rockefellers, a young guy by the name of John Wood, and they're going to try to put together a charter. They're going call this the Alcoholic Foundation. But how do you define us? What's an alcoholic? Well, they came up with this. What is the difference between an alcoholic and a non-alcoholic? That's where we first started using that word, anda. That's a joke. Anyway, Leonard Strong is going to be the secretary And you can see Richardson's there Chipman, Frank Amos, Dr. Bob And they're going to add two more drunks Now the problem in the ratio of that We have Class A and Class B trustees They had more Class A non-alcoholics Because they don't drink And the alcoholics were slipping all over the place So that was kind of difficult Bill's going to be on the steering committee, kind of as an advisory committee. And he's goingto start writing the book here. Now, some of you have been to New Jersey. This building is in New Jersey, it is called the Camelot Building. Hank P. is the first guy out in New York and he becomes Bill's partner. And they start a company called Honors Dealers and they're going to do car products. And they're gonna be in this building here. here's another picture of it and they hired this gorgeous gal here this is Ruth Hawk Ruth Hawk was a very good secretary and here she is with Bill and Bill's it's in pass it on if you read and pass it on it says she did not know what she was getting herself into when she took this job she thought it was car products but it wasn't car products she didn't see too much business going on. She either saw somebody passed out in a chair or somebody down on their knees making a surrender. By the way, if you visit Stepping Stones, this table is in the kitchen and this is where Bill and Abby sat when Abby made the call on Bill and he pulled out the pineapple juice. There's another picture of Ruth. Now, the interesting thing about Ruth is that when they start this deal up, they don't have any money. So they start like this stock company up and they get these stock certificates and they were worth nothing. But they were supposed to be worth $25 if the book ever got written. And they would rip off one of these $25 certificates, one, they'd ration her one a week. And little did she know, and there's the old typewriter. Now, we have word processors today. Can you imagine Bill's pacing behind her with a cigarette in one hand and he's dictating to her and she's typing up the big book? And this is Hank who had a terrible crush on Ruth. It was his idea, you know. He hadn't like an idea in a minute, so he's going to be the promoter. And little did she know, when I gave this talk for the first time, It was in our international in Toronto, and little did she know that the book she was typing would one day save her daughter's life. And Lori was my roommate, and I asked her to stand. She has over 30 years of sobriety in Chicago. That was pretty moving that she was there for that. Well, by the way, she got the five millionth copy of the big book in Montreal. So, what are some of the people that influenced Bill? You know, he didn't channel it all in. There was William James' Variety of Religious Experiences. That book, Bill said he devoured it in Towns Hospital. Have you ever tried to read that book? It's pretty hard to devour. And this book, What is the Oxford Group? I have to tell you a quick story about this book. I showed you the Gate Lodge. Well, there's a big, large property there, and we have harvest festivals there. So, I was attending one of those. It wasn't an AA event. It was a harvest festival, and they had a tent right behind the Gate Lodge. And it was an old book bin, and I'm kind of a, you know, not a junkie but a junker. You know, I'm always looking around for something. So I said, Do you have any old AA books? And they said no. And I said Well, do you have many spiritual books? And they say yes. And so my hand went across a little blue book, and it said What is the Oxford Group? And I was kind of newly sober. I had about three, four years sobriety. And I thought, hmm, I wonder, was that the Oxford movement? Was it the Oxford group? And I opened it up and it said, R.H. Smith, 855 Ardmore. His book, Please Return. Or should I say the book found me? I want you to know I tried to get them down to 25 cents, but they made me pay 35. By the way, you'll see that in Dr. Bob's house I did return it Common Sense of Drinking That's where we got the idea for our stories This is a big one The Sermon on the Mount by Emmett Fox If you ever get a chance to read that When we did not have conference-approved literature The co-founders had recommended reading lists As a Man Thinketh by James Allen Henry Drummond, The Greatest Thing was another classic that you might be familiar with. And this book, The Sermon on the Mount, heavily influenced both of our co-founders. And A.J. Russell from the Oxford group for Sinners Only. And I must mention Ebi. Those of you who might read Bill's story in the big book, you can almost number the steps that Ebi brings to Bill in Towns Hospital. all. So they were kind of, you know, Bill puts them into 12-step form, but those ideas were floating around. He's going to ask Ann Smith to write a story, Chapter to the Wives. Now, Ann was the kind of woman who was very, just wanted to stay in the background and she declines. Lois got a resentment. I think she might have worked it out in Al-Anon. I'm not sure. You know who writes chapter to the wives? Bill Wilson. For some of us, that's not our favorite chapter. So Bill's going to get busy writing the book. By the way, this is the document actually that I just received recently where Bill's actually writing to Dr. Bob and talking to him about what they're going to call the program and mentioning to Anne that he'd like to have her write the book and talking about the stories and how they developed. Bill starts, he's going to write an introduction. He's going to write his story and he's gonna write this chapter here There is a Solution. Now Bill really wasn't a writer. He hadn't really done much writing up to this time. And he's going to get an in to go to Harper's religious editor Eugene Exman and Eugene X-Men reads these three pieces and he goes, Bill, this is pretty good writing and now remember they're hungry and he says Bill, can you write more like this? And Bill says, yeah, well yeah, I can Well I'll offer you a $1500 advance if you'll write more. Well, can You Imagine Bill's Ego? He's up again, he's up So wait a minute, something wrong with the projector? What's going on here? Uh oh whoa wait a minute folks bill hi bill do you know where we are we're in stockholm sweden and i was just telling these folks about the writing of the book but you know a lot of people thought i knew bill because i talked to bill and i never knew him that you guys thought i was 75 years old is that right they were so grateful they were så glad i could scoot in a pair of tennis shoes so they could take me around. They were relieved. I feel like I know Bill. I've read everything he wrote, but I didn't meet Bill. However, I have the power to bring him back from the dead. So, Bill, would you be willing to share with them your perception of the writing of the book? Now then, as a graphic illustration of how pain and fear and all of our worst motives can eventuate under God's grace for the best, I would like to, in a hop-skip-and-jump fashion, tell you about the preparation of the AA book. Well, Bill, I was telling him about when you went to Eugene and you showed him the chapters and stuff and he offered you the money. Did you decide to take that money? A few of us stood for the proposition, well, this would be bad because control of our literature or it would be in other hands. And some of us, in a more self-serving way, and this definitely included me, we felt that the book might make some profits and some royalties out of which its creators could eat. Well, I think they're getting a sense of your personality, Bill. What did you decide to do? Some of us in New York considered the possibility of publishing this book ourselves. Really? Well, nobody knows about the program. What are you going to do about that? How are you gonna sell a book when there's only a couple guys sober, for God's sakes? What are we gonna do? What are they gonna do to get the word out? So then we went up to the Reader's Digest and told them about our budding movement and I guess we brandished Mr. Rockefeller's name pretty liberally, you know, as a close friend. He wasn't giving us any money, but he liked us. Well, did that work, Bill? Were they impressed? The digest said, well, fine. When will your book come out? By now it's the fall of 38. Oh, we set about next spring. They said this is just the kind of story that we'd like. We will do a piece. We'll put a feature writer on this. well Bill that's a pretty scary deal didn't you have some to write a whole book and get it published did you have any fears who would publish such a book who could assemble such a book what should go in it supposing it turned out badly these indeed for us were great and most natural fears. Well, did you have a plan? And then a plan came into being. It was thought there ought to be a text. It was taught these ought to be backed up by stories. And this text was in the first edition two-thirds of the stories came from Akron. Yes. Yes, they did, Bill. Bill, we have up there actually the outline for the book because it was Hank's idea and he wrote the outline. So what happened next? So down east we began to peddle stock in what turned out to be the AA book. But we were peddling stock to drunks, $25 a share. The purpose was what? To feed Wilson and the gal who helped do the book and the promoter and the collector of the money. Oh, I see, Bill. So this was your plan. One-third was going to go to you, one-third was goingto go to Hank, and you were going to after the rest of those folks getting sober for the restof the money Well, why did you call it Works Publishing? The title was chosen because there would be a lot more works, you know, after this. well there's the prospectus that you two wrote up can you tell us a little bit about what was in there so in the prospect us we totted up what the profits would be oh i think we started in with something like a hundred thousand books and uh you know the first few carloads and And I think we got as high as a million copies. Well, of course, if they only cost 35 cents and you sold them for $3.50, it would be, frankly, a great rise in that $25 stock. It might go to $1,000 a share. We didn't put all this on paper, but it was a part of the promotion. Well, then when you went and talked to the alcoholics, what did you tell them? and how did you get them to try to buy the stocks? We would sell these 35-cent books for the sum of $3.50. We didn't indicate any other expenses, but that seemed quite a margin of profit to the prospective stock buyer. And we pointed out that they couldn't possibly miss because, after all, the Digest piece with millions of circulation in which they definitely would mention the new book would simply move these volumes out in carloads. Well, that was a pretty absurd idea, don't you think? While this job was being done. In other words, people were asked to buy stock in a book that hadn't yet been written. I think this is the world's record for sheer audacity. Well, tell me, what was the reaction when you presented this plan? Well, this was heard out in this country that this ex-Wall Street swindler was contriving one of the greatest rackets known to the mind man. Well, what Was the response then? Well, when this motivation began to be suspected and became apparent, quite a violent opposition rose up. Well, tell us a little about that. What did you do? So then we had only begun our troubles. Then the book had to be written. So did you start writing? Well, I wrote another sample chapter and tried that on them. No stock purchases. Oh man, the trustees must have been pretty upset. And the trustees were very dubious. They had no money at the time, so we were able to face them down and say, well, we'll separately incorporate this. And sure enough, by an appeal to the loyalty of the stockholders to the cause, but also by an appeal to The Pocketbook, the base of nature, the money began to dribble in. $25 par bet. Well, I bet you're relieved now you can get started writing the book. And I know what you did is you wrote it chapter by chapter, and you would send it to Akron and have them look it over, and then they would send it back. Can you tell us a little bit about that process of writing it? However, we were reading, a few of us, on the stockholders' money, and little by little the chapters were evolved, and we thrashed them around in the AA meetings, and And we carefully checked them with Dr. Bob as they went along. And meanwhile, he had great pains and difficulty, got stories largely from this town. You know, that's right, Bill. And folks today can go visit that table at Dr. Bob's house where they gathered around. And Jim Scott got sober just in the nick of time because they were so uncomfortable writing their stories. They didn't know how to write them and edit them. So they got a little help there. Well, OK, so you were having these depressions and out of this depression this night, you're going to come out with the 12 steps. Would you tell us about how you wrote those? In short, here was AA at its worst. But under God's grace, coming up with something better. Maybe history will say the best. And so the work went on and I remember one night we got through the first four chapters which were window dressing and I was having an imaginary ulcer attack and it looked like, well things were very gloomy. The stockholders were kind of, you know, falling down. The meal ticket was getting in danger and I was very resentful. And I realized lying in bed there in Brooklyn Clinton Street that the book had to say what it was all about at some place. So I began to write and out came the 12 steps. Well, you used the six steps that you'd gotten from the Oxford group. and I know that you thought that an alcoholic could fall through the cracks. And then after you developed them into 12, you counted up 12 and you thought that was a great number and you couldn't wait to present them to the guys at Clinton Street. What was their reaction? Well, when they appeared there was a terrific uproar and as a result of the uproAR again the constructive came out. I had had a great spiritual experience, so that I had used God all the way through those 12 steps. Well, there was some agnostics that weren't real crazy about that. What was their reaction? Our atheist and agnostic contingent said, drunks aren't going to buy that. They're scared to death of being God-bitten. This ought to be a psychological book. Well then, what did the religious people think of that? On the other hand, the religious people said that it should be a strictly Christian book, theologically speaking. So one had to sort of average these point of views. Well, I know that was really a tough, tough time for you trying to get through that conflict. In fact, you began to say that you really didn't write the book at all. You umpired it. And when you finally agreed to God as you understand him, you called that a 10 strike because that's one of the reasons today that so many people from all over the world can come into Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, do you think you had God's help? Sure, we must have had God'S help. We never could have produced it ourselves. Well, can you kind of sum up what the writing of the book was like? So this is the unholy way in which God nevertheless graced us in the days when a was very young well the book got written but it needed to be published and that's a story in itself too tell us a little bit about how you got the book published well finally the great day our publication approached we had pre-publication copies of the book made, circulated round for criticism and with the last of our money, almost the last we persuaded the printer that this was such a terrific venture that he certainly ought to accept a 10% down payment for 5,000 books which were going out by the carload. What a deal. So we paid him $500 for 5,00 books Wow what a salesman you are well it was a woman's recommendation that you had a doctor's opinion so you asked your own doctor dr. Silkworth to write a letter and he did and we have that today and then you ask people to send back that manuscript copy and there's the copy that you and Hank worked from when you took the book to publication and you can see that it's all marked up you are asked to take the I out and put the we in. You were told that there was too much Oxfordizing in there, and in fact it was so sloppy and so marked up that you and Hank and Ruth and actually Dorothy Snyder had to take it to Cornwall Press and help them typeset it because you didn't want to type it again. And then there was the thing about the name. The 100 Men Corporation was one of the ideas. And then a woman got sober by the name of Florence and she said, you can't call it 100 men. You have to call it 100 men and one woman. And in you and your ego, you wanted to call it the Bill W movement. We already had out of nameless bunch of drunks. Dry frontiers makes me thirsty empty glass the way out and uh there was a guy that came in that kept saying anonymous alcoholics joe w anonymous alcoholics and he flipped it around and he found he got out of the nut house just in time to make that contribution and he says alcoholics anonymous And that name took. Did you like that? We'd been calling ourselves out there a nameless bunch of drunks, and from that the anonymity idea had come in. In fact, the book title, as voted by Akron, New York, and a few Clevelanders, was chosen as The Way Out. But in the Library of Congress, we'd found that there were 12 books by the name of The Wayout. So for heaven's sake, we couldn't make a 13th, so it became Alcoholics Tonight. And New York got its way, and if we'd have had our way in Akron, we'd be the way-outers today. Can you see the T-shirts? Then we went up to the Digest and said, now what about this piece? We're all ready to shoot. And the editor of whom we had talked vaguely remembered us, and he said, shoot what? Oh, you're kidding. Well, that must have been a horrible shock. Well, what did you do next? Well, we reminded our friend that a piece was due. And he said, gee, Mr. Wilson, he said we... You know, after you were here, I went to the rest of the staff here very sure that this would be a great piece. But they didn't think so, and I forgot to tell you. Oh, Bill. Man, what happened? I mean, what was that like? I mean you had everything set up, all the stock certificates and everything. What was that Like? So we had 5,000 books in the warehouse. There were 100 AA members. There were about 30 stockholders, and they each got a book. There were... There were around 30 guys who put stories in the books, and they both got a copy of the book. And that was 60 books. So we only had 40 books to sell the rest if they'd buy them. Oh, Bill. then things really hit didn't they well at that time things folded up in a big way we were about to be evicted from our house in clinton street stuff go into storage the book was bankrupt and we made one last great gasp effort oh my god what was that a drunk came along by the name of morgan who had been in the ad business and he said you know i know Gabriel Heater. You know, the guy who puts on those wonderful sob talks. And he said, I think Gabriel would put this on the air. So we scared up a few dollars more. And And to get ready for Gabriel, we decided. Well, you started sending those postcards, didn't you? Tell us about that. Well, we picked out a hard class of people to advertise to in those days. we picked out all of the physicians east of the Mississippi River, all of them. And to each one we sent a postal card which said, listen to Gabriel Heater as he talks about the new society of Alcoholics Anonymous and buy the book AlcoholicsAnonymous, a cure for alcoholism. Well, wasn't there a little problem with Morgan? Well, one great trouble with Ryan was that he wouldn't sober up and he was supposed to be interviewed on the air. My God, our last cent was in this thing and all these postal cards. Bill, what did you do to solve that problem? So just as a precaution, one of our friends who was a member of the Down Athletic Club said, well now, you can have my room over there. I don't use it much. Why doesn't somebody live with Morgan in there the week before? You know, to just stay with him and be sure he gets the heater all right. A little codependent. Okay. So did he? Did you guys pull it off? So the great day came. The postal cards was out. In Akron, New York, Cleveland, the ears were to the radio. We visioned the books going out in carloads, orders flooding in, biggest profit of all in direct mail, no commissions. and sure enough heater pulled out the tremolo stopped Ryan was sober and boy we were amazed well it went so well and then as I recall you had a post office box we gave a post office box 459 where we had a one room office little Ruthie Hawk who helped me with the book bless her soul my promoter friend Hank Parkers and I just couldn't wait to get over to see what was coming into that box you know you held back for three days and then you actually put luggage in the car to go get those cards and when you got there you were a little disappointed when you looked in that little glass box there because there wasn't too many in there what was hank's reaction hank was an incorrigible optimist he said well he could they couldn't put them all in the box he said they got several mail bags full out there. So the clerk came with the cards. Hank said, ain't there any more? No. We took them over to the desk and we counted them, and there were 12. And 10 of them were from doctors, obviously stewed themselves, who lambasted the hell out of us, and we had exactly two orders for the book Alcoholics Anonymous. Oh, man, there's some hard times. But you know, Bill, when there was hard times, you always pulled something out. What did you pull out of that? For us, almost more than any other society, pain has been the touchstone of our spiritual progress. So we can say, thank God that we have suffered such pains, that such a spectacle as this has been brought into view and being. I agree, Bill. Hey, Bill, Bill! Hey, say hello to Dr. Bob for us. I'm going to finish up. There's one little story here. In case when you read that book you may have ever taken it for granted that it's even in your hand. Things are pretty bad at this point. But they go ahead, and this is the book. And that's the jacket, by the way. It was designed by an artist whose story is in the first edition. Can you imagine trying to be anonymous and carrying that big thing under your arm with that circus jacket? What were they thinking? They used to turn the cover inside out. That was one of the possible book jackets they found at Stepping Stones later. The first copy of the big book that came off the press was Bill's. And in it, it says, note, this was the very first AA book off the press. We used thick paper to make the alcoholic feel they were getting their money's worth. Bill, I'm going to ask you, do you guys think you got your money's work out of that book? I sure hope so. And then to Lois, he writes, one whose loving care and fortitude in our dark days together made these pages possible. So to her, This first book of the first edition is lovingly and thankfully given Bill in memory of the fifth Christmas. So they're down and out, they're broke. The books, they are all sitting in warehouses. Not too many people know about Alcoholics Anonymous. In a magazine called Liberty Magazine, by the way, these magazines were only a nickel, so think how expensive that big book was at $3.50 at that time. Anyway, Morris Markey is going to do an article, but they don't have enough money to make it. So they really want that article, and they go to Burt the tailor, and that's his tailoring shop on Fifth Avenue in New York, and they ask him for money, only Burt doesn't have the money to give them. But he calls Mr. Cochran, who was a great benefactor, and they said, Mr. Cochran, we'll sell you these books for a dollar off and you could put them in libraries. And Mr. Corcoran says, send me your books and I'll look them over. So he looked our books over and he said, I don't think so. So Bert said, well, Mr., Mr. Cockren, would you lend me the money? And Bert hawked his business to save the big book, Alcoholics Anonymous. So we could get to that article. September 30th, 1939 it comes out. It was quite a big deal to those early members, and we got 600 inquiries. And another thing that we did not know was that Mr. Rockefeller had been watching us, and he wanted to introduce us to his friends. And in 1940, he holds a big dinner, and a lot of bankers and a Lot of important people were there. I mean, the list was any of the who's who in the United States at the time. Mr. Fosdick would be there, Dr. Kennedy would be there, Bill Wilson would be there, bankers and there he is, Morgan Ryan, the guy that was on the show and Nelson is going to preside over it because his father is sick now what they did is they put an AA member, they all got cleaned up and they put a AA member at each table. Now Morgan was a good looking Irishman and he cleaned up real nice and he had his suit on and he was at his table and one of the bankers looked at him and said, and what institution are you with? And he said, well I'm not really with an institution but I just got out of one not too long ago. Now Mr. Rockefeller never gave us any money I mean, yeah, very little, he did give us a little but it was the prestige and after that was over with he wrote a letter to every single person And those that were at the dinner got a first edition big book in a crate. It was pretty fabulous. So he really endorsed us. But what happened is his son stood up, and we thought we were going to get money again. See, the Rockefellers had joined us to help make our foundation. Imagine that. The Foundation of Alcoholics Anonymous was built by the Rockefeller's, if you look into the history that I just told you tonight. And his father, Bill never met J.D. So Nelson provides us over the dinner, and of course Bill's looking out at all this money. And he said, my father thinks this is a work of goodwill, and money will ruin it. And Bill says, with that, a couple billion dollars got up and walked out the door. We did pay the Rockefellers back, and here's some of our canceled checks. And we took an oath of poverty. And today we don't accept contributions from outside organizations. This was a hard lesson won. We're still in trouble though, folks We're in trouble until Jack Alexander shows up And he's just finished writing a story on rackets And he gets the story to write on Alcoholics Anonymous And he thinks we're a racket And he comes to Akron to bust us I think he went to Chicago and a few other cities But that's not what happened You see, the press can be our friend And he wrote a beautiful article In the Saturday Evening Post march 1941 and in that article six thousand requests came in and that really helped establish us so after telling you that pretty tough story really slender threads right can you imagine what this couple after going through being homeless living in the club and um uh you know just going through so much hardship, losing their furniture, having it be out on the curb. What do you think they're thinking as they watch big books be sent out all over the world in so many different languages? And Bill says it transcended the mountain and the sea and is even at this moment lighting candles in dark caverns and on distant beaches. Now I'd like to have you just take a moment of quiet, why we take a look at the credits of all the slender threads that went into this story. And I challenge you to remove one of them and think if we would actually have Alcoholics Anonymous today. Thank you. And, of course, the real author of the story is a higher power. Thank you.