Aa history Lovers 2004 moderators Nancy Olson and Glenn F. Chesnut page
Download 4.17 Mb.
|
| November 1952 AA Grapevine
IN MEMORIAM And In Thanks Two years ago, on November 16th, 1950, R. H. S., died in Akron, Ohio. It was Thursday, close to noontime, one week before what would have been his 71st Thanksgiving Day. It was fifteen years and five months after his own last drink...and it was fifteen years and five months in which he had personally ministered as friend and teacher and physician to 5,000 alcoholics. To each of them he was simply "Doctor Bob." And to history he will be "Co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous." And to Bill he is "The Prince of Twelfth Steppers"...and "The Rock Upon Which AA Is Founded"...and simply "Smitty." He met death serenely, for he had to the fullest given himself to life. He left the rich gifts of simplicity and love and service. We who have followed him in The Way Out give him thanks anew for the message he so tirelessly carried. And we think this man who learned true humility would most like the memorial that is still to come...those thousands now sick and despairing who will yet find our way out of dilemma into recovery…strengthened by the invisible hand of Doctor Bob...
(1950)
From: Lash, William (Bill) . . . . . . . . . . . . 2/15/2004 2:22:00 PM IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII December 1950 AA Grapevine Dr. Bob The tragic news of Dr. Bob's death came after this issue of the Grapevine had gone to press. No hastily written words can possibly describe the feelings of the thousands of AAs who knew him personally. And only the loving God who has been so merciful to us all can truly measure the greatness of his contribution not only to AA but to all mankind. We shall make here no mere listing of his devotions to AA. How in-adequate for a man who is a co-founder of something that has meant so much to so many. But even 'Co-Founder' does not serve. For Dr. Bob was the rock on which AA is founded. None who saw and heard him last summer at Cleveland will ever forget his characteristic statement -- the last he made in public -- " -- love and service are the cornerstones of Alcoholics Anonymous!" In loving tribute, the January issue of the Grapevine will be dedicated as a Memorial to our beloved Dr. Bob.
From: Lash, William (Bill) . . . . . . . . . . . . 2/16/2004 5:23:00 PM IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII I have always heard this quote as being attributed to Dr. Bob: "Carry the message. And if you must, use words." Can anyone tell me where this Dr. Bob quote can be found? Thanks! I found this other quote on a website attributed to St. Francis: "Preach always. When necessary use words". We recognize the importance of paying
attention to the substance of our message, but that is not enough. The manner in which we make that message known is as important as the message itself.
Barefoot Bill IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII ++++Message 1660. . . . . . . . . . . . Back to Basics - Compilation of excerpts from Previous Posts From: NMOlson@aol.com . . . . . . . . . . . . 2/17/2004 7:16:00 AM
impossible to search the entire list. For example, when a question was asked recently about Back to Basics I had forgotten that the subject was already thoroughly covered on the list. In an effort to clean up the list I am starting to combine posts on the same subject. The post numbers will stay but the message will be deleted after being combined in one message.
topic for the list, but I still think it is of interest to AA historians. In order to avoid repetition the following are excerpts from the posts re Back to Basics, usually not the entire message. I cannot verify the accuracy of all the posts.
movement Back to Basic and their connection to AA History. I was recently at a conference where I met some Back to Basic advocates who where making some questionable statements about how things were done in the early days. I was wondering how valid this back to Basic movement is in regards to actual AA program and it's history. Ernest Kurtz responded: From what I have seen and heard in well over two decades of study, the so-called "Back to Basics" movement is an attempt to re-create the Oxford Group as it existed in the mid-1930s. AA as we know it grew out of that, partially by rejecting aspects of those teachings. Some, from Henrietta Seiberling and James Houck on, have effectively tried to deny that separation and to bring "A.A." back under those auspices. The "Back to Basics" movement has many strengths and apparently helps many people. But its relationship to Alcoholics Anonymous is similar to the relationship of Judaism to Christianity.
Book has information about the development of the movement. In Michigan Meetings are starting to use the back to basic back as a class for taking the 12 steps. ... Here is a web site to check it http://www.aabacktobasics.com/index.html
attempting to re-create the Oxford Group movement seem odd. We DO feature an Oxford Group staple, a pamphlet called "How to Listen to God" in our practicing the 11th step. This we use as a guide to practice "quiet time and guidance." ,,, We also feature a simplfied "assets/liability" 4th step inventory that is described on the page next to the resentments/fears/sex thing in the Big Book.
the lack of controversy. But in the past few weeks, we have seen it begin and this topic is one that really has no place in this Group.
that has been written in the "Back to Basics" manual that is not Alcoholics Anonymous. With 63 years of time tested, experience proven success, no one has approached the success that is realized when an alcoholic PRECISELY follows the clear-cut directions that are outlined in the Basic Text for Alcoholics Anonymous which are obviously divinely inspired. ... I have been around long enough to see our Fellowship slip from: "Rarely have we seen a person fail....." to seldom do we see a person recover. Let's get back to the real Basics; the Basic Text for Alcoholics Anonymous which is titled, "ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS." ______ When questions appeared again recently I combined some of the responses as follows:
NO! "Back to Basics" is not the original AA program, and it had nothing to do with Akron. And I have to be emphatic about this. First, read Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, on the Frank Amos report of AA in 1938, pp. 130-136. You will find a good description of the real first program as employed by Dr. Bob Smith. There were no Steps. There was no classroom. There was the Bible, a morning Quiet Time, religious devotionals, prayer, no drunkalogs, church affiliation, and frequent hospital visits to new prospects. The "Back to Basics" approach, kicked up by Wally P., is an off-shoot of what Clarence Snyder was doing in Cleveland post-1939. Clarence said that his only two source books were the Big Book and the Good Book. Following the Cleveland Plain Dealer's outstanding articles on AA, membership exploded in Cleveland, and to keep up with it, and so that the program wouldn't get garbled, Clarence decided to start group classroom-type education classes. He would take the folks through the first nine steps. The last three, of course, was the daily program. Prayer, Quiet Time, a daily inventory utilizing the Four Absolutes (honesty, purity, unselfishness, and love) as yardsticks, and helping others. From: "Robert Stonebraker" A view of how Dr. Bob sponsored Earl Treat through Six-Step process, as it was at that time (1937), can be found on page 292 of the Third Edition (263, Fourth Edition) of the Big Book. ...
called: "Back To the 40's." The cover of which states: "Taking the 12 Steps in 5 one hour classes." Briefly, the meeting is chaired by a reader and a commentator as they "teach" the Twelve Step process in five classes by going through the Big Book. The person who gave me this is very involved in Akron AA history. From: "Arthur" BtB advocates that so-called original' AA (as practiced in Akron) had a remarkably high recovery rate no longer achieved today. They further claim that 90-180 days of their meetings "takes us back to the 'original' program that produced a 50-75% recovery rate." Somehow, someway, someone has concluded that BtB is getting a 50-75% recovery rate and the rest of AA has only a 5-10% recovery rate, depending on which study you read. According to BtB, contemporary AA is supposed to be errant due to its lack of orthodoxy relative to 'original' Oxford Group methodology and principles. Please don't take my word on it. Visit their web site and draw your own conclusion based on its content. ... A possible source of BtB's assertion of an "early AA 75% recovery rate" may derive from Dr Harry Tiebout's paper "Therapeutic Mechanism of Alcoholics Anonymous." It was originally published in 1944 and later reprinted [in 1957] in "AA Comes of Age." On pg 310, it states "Alcoholics Anonymous claims a recovery rate of 75 percent of those who really try their methods." I'd suggest that the key words are "really try" not "75 percent." ... Later in commenting about Bill W's spiritual experience (Bill is called Mr. "X") Tiebout states "According to Alcoholics Anonymous experience the speed with which the spiritual awakening takes place is no criterion of either depth or permanence of cure. The religious leavening, however little at first, starts the process; the program helps to bring it to a successful conclusion." The 1944 paper, I presume, would serve as a reputable description of AA's program of Recovery in its "early days." Tiebout goes on to list a series of numbers for the initial 7 years of AA: 5 recovered at the end of the 1st year [1935];15 recovered at the end of the 2nd year [1936]; 40 recovered at the end of the 3rd year [1937];100 recovered at the end of the 4th year [1938]; 400 recovered at the end of the 5th year [1939]; 2000 recovered at the end of the 6th year [1940]; 8000 recovered at the end of the 7th year [1941]. Jack Alexander's article in Sat. Eve. Post. It should be fairly obvious that the figures cited as "recovered" are membership estimates. While certain locales may have made claims of this or that success rate, there is no way anyone can verify those claims with reasonable confidence. The data to do so just doesn't exist. What appears to get used most in these scenarios are statements of articles of faith based on anecdotal assertion and sincerity. From a membership of 5 in 1935 to an international membership in excess of 2,100,000 today, perceived issues in success rates seem far more premised on imagination than information.
dated November 10, 1955 From: NMOlson@aol.com . . . . . . . . . . . . 2/17/2004 10:47:00 AM
the 2000 international convention. Across the top in Bill's handwriting it says "Ruth Hocks recollections."
original as possible. To clean up the list I am posting it here as one document. I have made no effort to correct punctuation or grammatical errors, so you language purists will just have to exercise tolerance. Nancy Nov. 10, 1955 Dear Bill: As I wrote to you last week it is difficult for me to get a long period of uninterrupted time together to put down my recollections of those old A.A. days - but I have about two hours - so here goes.
until I have the opportunity to check one thing against the other which I am willing to do if it ever proves necessary - neither do I insist that my memory is absolutely accurate - it will be easier if I can just sort of meander along for present purposes.
met you. I think I went to work for Honor Dealers in about January of 1936. The job I applied for was as Secretary to sort of a distributorship for a group of service stations - naturally I had no idea what a surprise fate had in store for me and what a change it would make in my personal life, in my relations to and my opinions of my fellow man. I walked into the Honor Dealers office in Newark, N.J. on Williams Street one Monday morning - was interviewed by Hank - and started to work immediately that morning. My immediate impression of Hank was that he had a vibrant personality - that he was capable of strong likes and dislikes - that he seemed to be possessed of inexhaustible energy - and that he liked to make
You arrived shortly thereafter Bill bringing with you an aura of quiet warm friendliness - of slow deliberate decisions - and at least I thought at the time, not much interest really in the Service Station business.
remember correctly, that first afternoon you had a visitor in your office and I think it was Paul Kellogg. Anyway, the connecting door was left wide open and instead of business phrases what I heard was fragments of a discussion about drunken misery, a miserable wife, and what I thought was a very queer conclusion indeed - that being a drunk was a disease. I remember distinctly
was roaring laughter about various drunken incidents. Fortunately I liked you both immediately - I am not too easily frightened - and you were paying $3.00 more per week than I had been getting - so I was willing to give it a try.
to come, we talked about "drunks" and not "alcoholics" and therefore I use those terms here.
importance it seemed to me after I began to know most of you original men, that it was only a means to an end - that end being to help a bunch of nameless drunks. Having come from a thrifty German family I know what I thought if you two would spend as much energy and thought and enthusiasm on Honor Dealers as you did on drunks you might get somewhere. That would be hard to prove either way and actually I've never known whether the original premise of Honor Dealers was sound. Anyway I soon stopped caring whether Honor Dealers was successful or not and became more and more interested in each new face that came along with the alcoholic problem and caring very much whether they made the grade or not. All of you made me feel as though I were a very worthwhile person in my own right and very important to you which in turn made me want
the success of A.A. - the generous giving of oneself to the needs of the other.
was more and more correspondence with drunks and more of them showing up in the office. In those days it was part of the procedure, if the prospect was willing to go along, to kneel and pray together - all of you who happened to be there. To me, drunkenness and prayer were both very private activities and I sure did consider all of you a very revolutionary lot - but such likable and interesting revolutionaries!
ideas had real merit or whether there was not enough prolonged effort or whether it was just a poor time for that kind of an idea I was not capable of judging then nor am I now. I only know that within about a year finances were precarious enough to move us into a tiny office in the same building and even then I was front man to explain to the superintendent why the rent wasn't paid on time and the telephone bill, etc. Payday was an indefinite affair indeed. I am somewhat confused about the timing of the move into the small Newark office because now that I think about it I remember that the book work was done in the large office.
to Doc Smith. You never liked to dictate to a shorthand note book - you always dictated directly as I typed. In the amazing way these things often happen, since word of what you fellows were doing in New York and by that time Doc Smith in Akron was simply spread vocally from mouth to mouth, inquiries began to float in from amazing distances and some of these you asked me to answer in my own fashion. That is, to refer them to the closest "educated drunk." "Educated" of course in the sense that they knew something of this new possibility of an answer to alcoholism.
everyone a feeling of great serenity - peace with himself and God - and an abounding wish to share what he had found with others. Somewhere along in there John Henry Fitzhugh Mayo also appeared (Offhand I have no idea of the dates) with his warm sense of humor and the all abiding wish to give to other
unbelievable degree.
through your dictation, Bill, through all I heard at the office and through the letters I was answering myself in your behalf I began to absorb an understanding of what it was all about and what you were trying to do and I became aware that the possibilities of writing a book were being discussed. Many of you thought it was an absolute necessity because even then the original idea was often distorted in the hundreds of word of mouth discussions. Its original basic simplicity was often completely confused beyond comprehension and besides it was becoming more and more impossible to fully expound the idea satisfactorily in letter after letter to various inquirers. Also, especially to the advertising type of man, the spread of the idea was going much too slowly and would become a sensation overnight if only put out in book form!!
it, Bill, and I know that you spent endless hours discussing its general form with everyone who would listen or offer an idea - especially with Doc Smith, Fitz and Hank. As soon as you began to feel you had at least a majority agreement you began to arrive at the office with those yellow scratch pads sheets I came to know so well. All you generally had on those yellow sheets were a few notes to guide you on a whole chapter! My understanding was that those notes were the result of long thought on your part after hours of discussion pro and con with everyone who might be interested. That is the way I remember first seeing an outline of the twelve steps.
twelve steps is still essentially today what you scribbled on the original yellow sheets. Of course there were thousands of small changes and rewrites - constant cutting or adding or editing but there are only two major changes made that I remember, both fought out in the office when you and Hank and Fitz and I were present. The first had to do with how much God was going to be included in the book itself and the 12 steps. Fitz was for going all the way with God, you were in the middle, Hank was for very little and I - trying to reflect the reaction of the non-alcoholic was for very little too. The result of this was the phrase "God as you understand Him," which I don't think ever had much of a negative reaction anywhere. We were unanimous that day and you got a greenlight everywhere you showed that typewritten copy including Doc Smith and the Akron contingent where a copy of everything was sent for O.K. or criticism.
was that originally it was directly written to the prospective alcoholic, that is -- "You were wrong" -- "You must" -- "You should" and after a big hassle, this was changed to read -- "We were wrong" -- "We must" -- "We should" -- etc." This was quite a job because by the time this major revision was decided on most of the book had been finished in its first draft at least and each chapter as well as the 12 steps had been slanted toward
At this time I had still attended very few meetings but I know that the office confabs and final decisions were only made after the aforementioned hours of discussion with all who cared to take part in them with you so that the majority opinion of all who attended meetings at that time was reflected in the final decisions.
Download 4.17 Mb. Share with your friends:
|