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Source: Clancy I – Stateline Retreat 2009 – Speaker Talk – Date Unknown.mp3 File: clancy-i-stateline-retreat-2009-speaker-talk-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:05:57
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My name is Clancy I., and I'm an alcoholic. My big problem tonight, it's a quality problem, but it's a problem. Why did they move Dr. Jung from over there to over there? You see him over there? He was over here earlier. I'm glad to be here tonight. I'm glad to be safe and sane and sober, as I like to say. Because I didn't used to be, and I may not be again. I think this is a wonderful event. Bob started this five years ago, I guess.
And I've been present at most of them whenever I could, and I always enjoy it. Hear good speakers talking about subjects they know something about. Not a bunch of philosophers and what-ifs, but real AA. And I very much enjoyed Charlie's talk. He told me tonight that he was nervous talking before I talked. But just to be fair, I'm nervous talking after he got done. But I'm here to talk about something, not about the steps.
This is something else. And most people with long-term sobriety may know all about it already. So you may doze off. But there's a lot of people here, I'm sure, who don't. Because I didn't. I was around AA for years, and I didn't understand. I knew all the bits and pieces. I didn't know where they fit into the scheme. And so I want to talk to you just a little bit tonight. What a remarkable thing that Alcoholics Anonymous exists.
You know, Charlie was talking about real alcoholics and alcoholics of our type. But there seem to be a couple types of alcoholics. And we don't talk about it much, but there are a couple types of alcoholics. There's a type of alcoholic who seems to be an alcoholic by the way you measure them. They drink and get in trouble and have things happen. If something happens that really threatens their security, maybe someone dies or maybe they lose their job or lose a family, and they quit and they never drink again.
And I know several people like that, but I swore we were alcoholics. And that same type of person, if they had become physically addicted to alcohol, which we don't hear much about, but physical addiction to alcohol is much worse than lethal, more lethal than drug addiction. When you come off drugs, you get awfully sick and it's just terrible. When you come off an alcohol addiction, you sometimes die, smashing your head to the sidewalk.
But they are the people for whom treatment centers were originally created to medically withdraw them and point out the error of their problems all the way along. And they came out and they learned their lesson and they quit and they never drank again. There's a very famous hospital up in Seattle called Schick Shadel who still advertises, we will cure your alcoholism in one month, including follow-ups.
And we think that's funny, but they have a whole list of names of people that have done that for them. That's one type of alcoholic. Then there's another type of alcoholic who seems to be an alcoholic by the way you measure them. They drink and get in trouble and have problems. If something happens that really threatens their security, they lose a job or a family or somebody dies and they quit. But they always begin to drink again.
And these same people came out of treatment centers with tears of sincerity rolling down their cheeks. I've learned my lesson and they quit, but they always drink again. And those are what we call alcoholics of our type. That's what Bill describes. And there's never been an answer for these people. And the history of them, written history goes back 4,000 years of talking about people that had this problem with alcohol.
At one time they thought they must be possessed by the devil, put them to death, flog them, send them away. And this went on for hundreds and thousands of years. Doctors and medical men and religious people and philosophers and everybody tried. There's just no dealing with them because no matter what they said or promised, it was not going to happen. Even when I was born, which was a long time ago, but not 4,000 years.
Felt like it this morning, but not now. But when I was born, there was still no answer to it after all these years. When I was a little boy up in Wisconsin, of course I didn't know or care either, but you know, there still was no answer. The best answer when I was a young kid was the Keely cure, where they'd give you drugs in alcohol and make you sick. And so you didn't want anymore. And it worked perfectly until you got out and you found a bar where they didn't put drugs in alcohol.
Which reminds me, this has gone on in the early 1960s. I was sober. I was working in a medical corporation.
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And the Los Angeles Times one day, they had a full page article on the new answer to alcoholism.
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The Seventh Day Adventists at the White Hospital had found an answer and they just had 100% recoveries. And I read this, of course, and they had set up one of their dead set against drinking, but they realized alcoholism exists. They took one of their wards and turned it into a bar, with a full bar, with a back bar with booze and everything, and a bartender. And they'd bring these poor mopes in there for treatment.
You want a drink? You got drugs and that stuff? No, not really. They'd give you a drink of whiskey, it had a little cord on it so it wouldn't steal the glass, I guess. Hey, you Seventh Day Adventists know how to treat alcohol. Give me another one, will you? And they'd do it every morning. You want a drink? I sure do. Boy, this is a treatment center I could go for, you know. And finally, after a while, one morning they'd send an electric shock through that cord.
I'll hold the ice next time, will you, Fred? Then they'd give him a couple of drinks without it. Then they'd give him a drink with it. And after a while, these poor boobs just, you know, by frightened fawns, you know. Finally, they said, no thanks, and they did that two mornings in a row that we knew they were all right. And they ran a whole full-page story about it. And then about two years later, someone did a follow-up.
And nobody was sober at all. Most of them hadn't gotten by the first bar, they didn't have cords on the glasses, you know. It goes on and on. That's what's so remarkable. In 1930, there was a wealthy family in New York who had a son they were grooming to run their company. It was the Depression, but they were wealthy. And this son was about 35 years old, I guess. And he had a funny problem. He sometimes would get terrible attacks of nerves.
And when he got these attacks of nerves, sooner or later he drank whiskey and got drunk. And they were so shocked by this. And so they thought, we want to do something about this. So they found the best psychiatrist in the world and contacted him to take care of their son. That was Dr. Freud. And Dr. Freud refused the case. Which was the first break we ever got. We'd all be here at night, drunk, saying, Well, I dreamt I was sober again.
So they went to his colleague, Dr. Jung, who had been demoted to the lower echelons. Sorry, Dr. Jung. We were talking before the meeting. These two gentlemen are going to speak later. And I pretended to be Dr. Jung. I said, what is your problem? One says, I think I'm a wigwam. The other one says, I think I'm a teepee. And I said, huh, I see your problem. You're too tense. Ah, shut up. We are a glum lot.
But so they sent their son over there. And the son put him in his sanitarium in Switzerland. And apparently Dr. Jung talked to him every day and worked with him to break through these psychic walls that were confining him. And after about a year, he seemed to be doing very well. He said, Roland, I think you understand now the nature of your problem. I don't think you'll have any more of these nervous attacks.
And if you do, you won't drink. You may go home now. So he went home, and he stopped in Paris. He was a very wealthy family he came from. Some wealthy friends of theirs had dinner for him to celebrate his newfound health. And everybody had a glass of wine. And a couple of days later, he was face down in his own vomit again. And nobody could understand why. Such a nice man. How could he do that? So they took him back to Dr. Jung's sanitarium.
And Dr. Jung refused to take him back. Which was a great break for us, it turned out. But they said, why? The guys who brought him back said, he didn't mean any harm, doctor. He just seemed to get these nerves. He said, you know, I'm not angry at him. I now realize I've misdiagnosed his case. I thought he was, I thought he needed some deep psychiatric help. But I realize now he is what is known as a chronic alcoholic.
And to the best of my knowledge, there is no effective treatment for that condition today in the world at any cost. That was 1931, not all that long ago. And Rowland, of course, was taken aback. He said, what does this mean, doctor?
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He says, it means that you must keep yourself confined voluntarily or involuntarily as long as you live. Or otherwise you almost certainly will intermittently drink to excess until you die or go mad. Bad news. He says, is there any possible other method at all, doctor? He says, in reading through the literature, I've noticed that there's been one or two citations where people like you have had some involuntary psychological reversion.
They call it a spiritual experience of some kind. But he said, I would think that your chances of being hit by lightning are better than that. It's such a rare thing. And so Rowland left. Came home a much chastened individual. On the ship he did something. He didn't stop for dinner with his friends this time. And on the ship he did something that most of us have to do if we're ever going to stay sober any length of time at all, I guess.
He surrendered to the fact he was hopeless. And he came back to New York and he didn't know what to do. He was an elder in the Presbyterian church, but that hadn't helped him. He believed in God. That hadn't helped him. He thought, if I could just do something, as he wrote later, I wanted to stay sober as long as I could so when I died drunk my parents would have a pleasant memory of me. And by an odd coincidence, another one of the odd coincidences, at that time there was something going on in New York and all over the country.
It was at the height of his career. In 1910, there was a minister up in Pennsylvania who felt Christianity was getting a little too loose. I mean, people weren't really dedicated to it like they were in the first century where they'd be willing to crucify it and burn for their belief. So he started a little movement called the First Century Christian Association. Didn't get a lot of play. Didn't get a lot of play.
You know. I'm not going to go down there and be crucified. Screw you, Jim. But he got a few mopes. Then after the First World War, he went to Europe. And for some reason, the students at Oxford just ate it up. Oh yeah, that's what we needed. A structure for religion. And they really took it up so much, in fact, they changed the name to the Oxford Group. And he came back in the late 1920s, now with the crest of the Oxford people and all these other things, and all of a sudden, the Oxford Group began widely spread all over America.
Very much of a fad. Like, just people wanted to get into it. What it really consisted of in the last analysis of nice people, upper, better type people, getting together in one another's homes and discussing deep spiritual values and how they could increase their understanding of God. And the Oxford Group. And our friend saw that. Roland saw that and thought, well, maybe if I go there for a while, I can stay sober a while.
It's some kind of, they seem to be doing well. And he went to the Oxford Group. And for some reason, he got caught up in it. There was such a sense of enthusiasm among some of the people. He got caught up and he stayed sober. And he did very well. And he went back and ran the company for his family and became successful. And two or three years later, his family was so proud of him. They said, Roland, you're doing so well.
We're so proud of you. You know, our country home where we've always gone to in the summertime when you were a little boy. Why don't you go up to Vermont? Take a week, a couple of weeks. Go up to Vermont and just relax. We'll run the company when you come back. You really deserve all sorts of laudatory action. So he said, OK. And then he just went up there one week. And the irony is this. If he'd have gone two weeks later, there'd be no AA.
There'd be nothing. If he'd have gone a week later, there would be any AA. It sounds dramatic, but it's true. So he got there. And the day after he got there, one of his childhood friends that he knew when he went up there came up and said, Roland, our chum, Ebby, that you used to know, he's become a terrible drunk. Would you talk to him? Because I know you're sober now. He said, sure, I'll talk to him.
And he brought Ebby over and he said, Ebby, I'm in the Oxford group and we're finding a new way to approach God. Ebby, I don't want to hear that crap. I don't want to hear that really. And later that same week, he was drunk again and ran his car into somebody's house and was under severe, he was already on severe probation. Now he had to go to court Friday. And the same kid came over to see Roland and said, Roland, you've got to come to court.
Do something for them. I had to come to court. Do something for the judge. The judge is my father, but he won't
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listen to me. But he'll listen to you because he knows your family and he knows you. Could you come to court, please? Okay. So we came to court and said, you know, judge, I used to drink myself, but I don't drink anymore. If you would release Ebi to me, I'll take him back to New York and put him in the Oxford group and he won't be any trouble to you and maybe it'd save his life. And the judge says, only because it's you. I would not do it for anyone else, but I know your father and I know you. You take him out of Vermont, but if he comes back to you, he's going to the penitentiary. So I took him out of New York and stuck him in a mission on Lower Broadway and got him active in the Oxford group. After he didn't really like it, but he didn't like it a lot better than the Vermont penitentiary.
And after a few months, Roland said, well, Ebi, it's time to testify. I said, what? He said, you know, after you're here a while and you're learning new values, we want you to find someone and testify to them what you found. And Ebi said, I don't want to testify to anybody. That's embarrassing. You want to go back to Vermont? No, I believe I'll testify. I mean, these people were fallible people, you know, all of us. And he thought, who could I testify to? And he suddenly remembered. He had another friend from Vermont, what a hotbed that was up there. Last he heard, he was drunk in New York, a mooch living off his wife, couldn't hold a job, just a bum. He thought, I bet I could testify to him. He will remember it the next day. So he got ahold of Bill Wilson in Brooklyn, made arrangements to call on him. We know in our book, from Bill's point of view, he said, well, he came to the door and looked so nice. I said, gee, Ebi, you look so good. He said, yeah, I got religion.
And I felt a little put down. And that didn't go into very much detail. I heard Ebi talk at the 1960 International Convention, the only time he ever talked at a convention. And he gave a few more details. He went in, sat down, and tried to explain the Oxford group to Bill. And he said, that's really wonderful, Ebi. I bet your hair happened. And that made him upset. God, I hate to be outsmarted by a drunken boob like that. So he came back about three days later, and he had the Oxford group closer with him. Hi, Mr. Wilson, I want to tell you a little bit about the Oxford group. And Bill did a decent person with him. He got drunker than ever. And sobered up briefly in early November.
And thought, gee, I really did act pretty badly to Ebi. I guess he was trying to help me. I'll go over to that mission in Manhattan, and I'll apologize. So he went over there and got drunk on the way just to keep his hand in. Got to the mission. Ebi wasn't there. So he gave a short sermon anyway to the folks just to make him feel better. Staggered off down the street. And soon he was in the hospital again. In the hospital one more time. This time was a little different. Dr. Silkworth, I took that picture to my barber, and I said, I want to look like that. I really got a head of curly hair. But Dr. Silkworth called Mrs. Wilson and said, Mrs. Wilson and Lois, I have some bad news. I don't think your husband has any more trips to us left. I don't think he's going to live through many more if he lives through this one. And she was just aghast. So she called the mission and said, Ebi, could you please go up and talk to Bill? He's in this town hospital. So Ebi took a couple of guys and went up and talked to them. He said, we'd like to talk to you, Bill. You got to find a power greater than yourself. He said, I don't want to hear that religious junk. That never helps anybody.
Okay. So they went home. In the middle of the night, this loser, bum, undeserving person woke up in the night in a terror. And he said, if there's a God, show yourself to this empty room. And all of a sudden he said, there was a light in the room, like someone had turned on a light and there was wind blowing through from somewhere. And he knew he was going insane. He knew he was insane. Then the wind died down and the lights went out. He terrified, laid in his bed, terrified. Next morning he told the doctor, the doctor said, I think I snapped last night. I think I had a terrible psychiatric breakdown. I don't think so, Bill. I don't think so. Whatever it is happened to you, whatever you found, hang on to it. You look like a different man. And eventually Bill left that hospital and went to the Oxford group. Now you say, well, what's all the other crap about Bill and Ebi and Roland? Because of the few people that ever had a spiritual experience, they always associated with church work and they'd go into church work
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and never be heard from again. But because of what Ebi had been talking to him about, he thought he had some sort of a calling to help drunkards. So he went to the Oxford group and he went assiduously and he wanted people, he wanted to help people. He would find street drunks, all slobbering, vomiting, sick, and bring them to a, with all these nice people. I'm afraid you're vomiting on my shoes, sir.
And sometimes you take him home and nobody ever stayed sober, just a joke. You talk to him about God and higher powers. And after a few months of this, he got up one morning and he saw his wife putting on her sweater with a patch on the sleeve, who had once upon a time been a pert little society girl, now old before her time with gray hair, going to work in the two-bit department store to make a few dollars so he could afford to go to Manhattan and help people go to the Oxford group. And he had a terrible wave of revulsion.
He said, Lois, I want you to know I apologize. God, I thought I had some sort of calling to help people, but I don't. I'm going to get a job. I don't care if it's shoveling dirt. I'm going to get a job and I'm going to let you rest. I'm so sorry I've made your life so much so bad, honey. I'm just, I just, it's ridiculous. I've tried to help people every day and not one person has stayed sober. To hell with it. And right there, the AA movement died in its infancy, momentarily. And then she turned to him and said something that changed the course of history.
I was having lunch with her some years ago in Connecticut. I said, how did you ever think that answer, Lois? My God, it's just changed the course. She said, I don't know, it seemed so obvious to me. He said, not one person has stayed sober. And she said, you did. Oh yeah. That's why old timers don't have much hair in front. You just go, oh yeah. So he went down to see Dr. Silkworth. My hair is neater than his, for Christ's sake. Anyway, he went down to see Dr. Silkworth and Dr. Silkworth, she said, I can't seem to get anybody to understand what I'm trying to do.
And Dr. Silkworth says, don't you understand, Bill? Drunks don't respond to religion. No drunk ever responded to religion. Very, very rare if it ever happened. What you have to offer them is that you know how they feel and why they drink and that you don't drink anymore. That's what you have to offer them. I want to tell them about God. Well, you tell them about God later. You tell them that I know how you feel.
She said, okay. And then somebody came along and offered Bill a job. He said, I noticed you're staying sober, Bill. I know you're making a comeback. I'll give you one chance. If you blow this one, you're done, but I'll give you a chance. We've got a deal out in Akron. We'll have to buy up some proxies on our behalf. We'll take over this company. You'll be president and we're on our way. Bill went out to Akron, and as we all know, the deal blew up in his face.
The day before Mother's Day in 1935, he stood in a hotel lobby at $10 in his pocket. He could either pay his hotel bill or buy a train ticket home. And I knew to go home and admit one more failure. I can't do anything. I'm no good. I never will be any good. And he heard, I stood that same spot in the lobby a few years ago. I'm kind of a romanticist, trying to recreate what it must have been like. And over there's a door with a little curve sign over it saying cocktails.
And he said, there were sounds of music. I suppose from a jukebox, because on Saturday morning, there wouldn't be a lot of people in there. But he realized then, he said, if I just had a couple of drinks, I could think of an answer. And he started to go. And we almost died right there. And out of the corner of his eye, he saw some telephones. And he went over there, because he promised these people in the Oxford group he'd call somebody before he got drunk. Nobody ever thought he was going to get drunk again. Incidentally, let me just mention something about that situation right there.
Many, many people come to AA to have a remarkable feeling of getting well and doing better. So well, in fact, they don't even do it anymore. They don't have to do it. They've got the answer. Now, just stop and think. Bill Wilson had a true spiritual experience. And six months later, he was ready to drink. I mean, when the heat's on, people like us drink.
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So we went over to these phones. I don't know if you know small town hotels. They used to have the list of the churches, the big churches, the minister's name, and their phone number over the phones. So we took a nickel, called the top one. So I'm Bill Wilson, I'm a rum hound from New York, and I'm going to find someone in the Oxford group to talk to about my drinking. The man said, I really don't know what you're talking about, sir. I'm trying to write a sermon. Please don't bother me.
Hung up. Called the next one. Nobody home. Called the next one. No answer. Called the next one. I don't know. I can't help you. Sorry. And right there, I don't know about you, but if that had been me at that phone, I did what I said I would. I just need a couple drinks. But the last name he saw, the last name at the bottom there, Walter Tunk. I better call it Walter Tunk. That would give me one more rejection from that strange-sounding fool.
So he called Walter Tunk, who turned out to be probably the only man in Akron who could have helped him. He said, funny you should call. Funny you should call. A woman in my congregation was telling me about a member of their Oxford group who was a doctor, who just admitted in the Oxford group that he was a terrible drunkard and he couldn't help himself. And everybody's worried about him. Why don't you stay in that phone booth and I'll get back to you and see if I can browse it. So he called the woman who was an heiress to the U.S. rubber company fortune, just divorced from a guy. She had a mansion out in West Akron. And she said, yes, that's true, Reverend. Let me see if I can get a hold of Mrs. Smith and see if we can get the doctor to meet him. She called Mrs. Smith. Mrs. Smith picked up the phone. She said, now there's someone here from the Oxford group in New York and he seems to have some way to stop drinking. Would you like to talk to him alone or Ann? Ann said, God, I'd love to. But the doctor's drunk, laying on the floor. He can't even get up. She said, could we do it tomorrow? I'll get him. I'll get him out there tomorrow. Okay.
So she called the doctor, I mean, called Reverend Tunk back, called Bill back. And what's interesting about that, just stop and think, if any one of those phone calls hadn't been answered, I wouldn't be here. If Ann Smith hadn't been home, if the Harris hadn't been home, if Bill Wilson got tired of waiting in that damn hot phone booth, God, it just sends a shiver down your spine. But so they made arrangements to meet in her mansion, or the gatehouse of her mansion in Akron. The next day, Bill had instructions on how to take the streetcar out there. And this doctor, Dr. Bob, as we all know, was in his car, too sick to drive. So his son, young Smitty drove, 16 years old, and his sister in the front seat, and his parents in the back. And he always liked to tell that story about how his father just kept saying, Ann, I'll go out and listen to this guy, but I'm so sick of sermons, I'm not going to listen to it very long. I'll give him 10 minutes, that's what I'll give him, because I know I spoiled Mother, today's Mother's Day, and I've spoiled that for you, and I'm awfully sorry, but I'll give him 10 minutes. So they got out there, and after the foldy roll, these two men went in the room for their 10 minutes, and came out four hours later. And the doctor said, my God, Ann, that's the first man I ever talked to who seems to know how I feel, and why I drink.
My God, it's just, it's like a miracle. He said, Bill, I know you probably got to get home, but could you stay with us, maybe just a short while, that we could talk some more about what we can do? And Bill felt in his pocket, and had no way to get home. Yes, I can. So he stayed with them, and he and Dr. Bob spent the next two weeks going to Oxford group meetings, and discussing the spiritual values therein.
And after two weeks, Dr. Bob was glowing, and he said, Bill, I feel wonderful. I'm going to go to this weekend in Atlantic City, is the American Medical Association convention. I was there last year, and I was drunk. I was drunk, and they ridiculed me. If you stay here with my wife and kids, I'll be back Tuesday morning, or Monday morning, or Tuesday morning. I want to go and show them what we found. So away he went. And Tuesday morning, early in the morning, six o'clock, phone rang. Mrs. Smith answered the phone. Woman said, hi, I'm so sorry to tell you this, Mrs. Smith, this is Dr. Bob's office nurse.
This is Mrs. Smith. This is Dr. Bob's office nurse. The station agent called me this morning. They carried the doctor off the train so drunk he couldn't walk, and they laid him on the platform,
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and he called me to come down and get him, and I've, the cab driver and I've got him on the floor of his office, and we feel so bad because we know so much what you were trying to do, and it didn't work, and I'm awfully sorry, and she cried. And Mrs. Smith and her friend Bill Wilson went down and got this drunken, crying, sick puke, you know, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, ah shut up, you know. People get tired of that kind of crap after a while, I've discovered.
I mean not me, I mean different people, sorry. And so they put him to bed, and he woke up a couple days later and said, Jesus, what day is it, Ann? He said, Thursday morning, Bob. Oh my God, oh my God, I've got to do a cancer surgery today. Look at my hand, I can't hold a knife. My God, they'll take my license, oh my gosh. But they got him up and bathed him and put his clothes on. His new friend Bill got him some booze to steady his hand, and he went off in his car and said, I'll be, I'll be home about 1 30.
And so they waited for him, didn't get home at 1 30, or two, or three, or four, or five. Everybody knows the old son of a bitch was drunk again. About six o'clock, he burst through the door, cold sober. I just feel wonderful. He said, where you been, Bob? He said, when I was doing that surgery, I was thinking, they want people to make amends for the harm they've done, and I thought a doctor shouldn't have to make amends, but I realized I'm a human being, not a doctor.
So I've been all afternoon making amends all over Akron, and I just feel wonderful. And that was June 10, 1935, which is the birthday of our organization, because neither one of them drank after that. But they realized one thing, that sitting talking about spirituality didn't work. And Bill thought about it too. He said, I guess you got to do that. But I seemed to feel better when I was helping people.
They had to communicate. Just sitting talking about spiritual values is nice, but it isn't enough to keep people like us sober, apparently. So the doctor knew a nun up in the hospital, Sister Ignatia. You couldn't get drunks in hospitals, and you had to be gastritis, make up some phony thing. But she told the other lawyer up there that was in bad shape, so they tried to make arrangements to see him.
Now, I'm going to tell you, I told Tom this on the car over, coming over here, I think. I don't know if this really happened, because it's hard to remember at my age, but in 1960, I kissed Sister Ignatia on the cheek. And I remember that happening. Then I got dull after that. It seems to me she's, I said, oh, is it all right to kiss a nun? And I think she said, as long as you don't get in the habit.
I can't remember every little detail that long ago. But they wanted to talk to this guy, so Sister Ignatia put him in touch with his wife. And I heard him speak years ago, many years ago, Bill D. He said, I was laying in that bed in Akron. I was a lawyer from Louisville, but I wound up in Akron. And my wife came in, told me two fellas wanted to talk to me about drinking. And I said, absolutely not. I'm not going to listen to any more sermons, listen to all the more nonsense. I've had all that I can do.
But my wife's a rather strong woman, so I talked to those two fellas. And they never talked to me about drinking once. They talked about their drinking and how they felt. I thought, my God, there are other people in the world like me, and I couldn't believe it. And he became number three. Then they had got a few people, the local people, not many of them stayed because they didn't have any place to take him except at the Oxford group meetings. And boy, they'd just hear about Jesus and God, nothing about St. Silbert, which would turn him off. One of the funny little guys they picked up, a guy named Ernie, a young man, he was 29. They thought, you're probably too young to be really an alcoholic, but you do drink bad, so we'll try to help you. And he went around with them and doing things, and he fell in love with Dr. Bob's daughter, which sounds beautiful, doesn't it? He did, although he didn't know it at the time, he brought our organization its first relationship. I don't know a word that chills a sponsor worse than that one.
I want to talk to you about my new relationship. Oh, Jesus.
[00:35:04]
You just have to have a machine on your desk that says, uh-huh, uh-huh. Because they say wonderful things, you know. I know, Clancy, I thought the last girl was this, but today, Jesus, when I saw her walking out of detox, I just knew. But they got married, this young man, Ernie and Bill's daughter, or Dr. Bob's daughter, which again sounds wonderful. That happened in my family. My youngest daughter, Susan, several of you know, married a guy I sponsored, about six years sober. I was not for it, but I was outvoted by all the women in my family. What does daddy know? He doesn't know anything.
So they got married, and I want to tell you the absolute epitome of mixed emotions, watching your daughter go down the aisle to marry a man whose fifth step you've heard. You can't really say anything, but you can give hints. Let me know if he ever brings a sheep home, honey. But they provided me with a lot of grandchildren, and now great-grandchildren, so I forgive them. And this Ernie, they said, Ernie, you know, you don't really need to be run around. You're a newlywed. You stay home and take care of your wife for a while. You have a little honeymoon at home, and we'll go take care of all these other things. So they were quite shocked when he got drunk and turned her against AA for 50 years. But eventually, life went on. Then eventually, pretty soon, Bill went back to New York and started an organ group there, and they had these two little tiny groups.
And they thought, you know, the trouble is we can't get people, because in those days, they talked to the adult only, really low-bottomed, sick, sick, sick people, drunk. We have to get people in the hospitals, but they won't take them in the hospitals. But if we built our own hospital, we have a place to say, we're going to help. Yeah, but where the hell are we going to get the money to raise a hospital?
We'll write a book. We'll write a book. That'll make us so much money in royalties. We'll build a hospital in Akron. We'll build another one maybe in New York, and we will be on our way. So Bill Wilson sat down, and thinking about all the things he had seen and what he knew about the Oxford group, he wrote a book. He called it at first The Way Out, and they found in the copyright department, there were about 10 books already named that. So they made it Alcoholics Anonymous.
And they published it, and they sent a postcard to all the doctors in the eastern United States, and only one ever ordered one, and he didn't like it. So there's no hospital out here. But it's, you know, it's a funny thing, that book. Charlie talked about it at length, and it's true, but you know, when you're new, that book is not very inspiring, I must say. When I first came to AA, my sponsor had me read the book, and I read it, and I'm an incipient writer. I was on my way to becoming a writer, and they say it's a badly written book. It isn't a badly written book. It's just dull, just dull.
I just put it aside. Some years later, when I came off Skid Row and went back to AA, and my new sponsor had me read that book, I said, I read, I didn't have any front teeth, I read that book. I'll read it again. And I read it again, and I realized my memory had played me tricks. It was much duller than I remembered. I wrote things, buy this product, take this action. You read it, you're looking for a little inspiration.
If you are thorough at this stage of your development. But I was so ill, I took to what my sponsor said, and I later found out that all those things were in the book. I didn't know at the time. But the funny thing about the book is, if you stay sober a little while, the book begins to make sense. It has even a more remarkable character. It gets smarter every year you're sober. I've been reading this book for over 50 years. They still are sneaking things in there that I never saw before. That wasn't there last year. What is it? And when you're new, it's kind of tedious. They say things like, this book is a
[00:40:05]
miracle. That's no word is more badly used in AA than miracle. Everything's a miracle. Heard a guy a few years ago. He said, I got up early this morning. I looked at the Eastern sky and the sun was rising. And I said, it's a miracle. I've been given another day. Get up early tomorrow and have another one. You goof miracles are supposed to be unexplainable or inexplicable. As they say, what's a miracle about this book? Well, a couple of little things there's odd.
This guy who wrote this was three years sober, no background in medicine, no background in psychology, abnormal psychology, surrounded by people who are getting drunk mostly. And if you're new, you might think, Jesus, by the time you're three years sober, you should know enough to write a book. When you get to be three years sober, you'll discover you don't. When you're five years sober, you just try to be nice to people three years sober. Hang in there, Jimmy, you're doing a good job. By the time you're 10 years sober, you hate to send people three years sober to get your coffee. And that two creams and one sugar or two sugars. I'll get it myself for Christ's sake. By the time you're 20 years sober, you hate to have people three years sober unattended on your property.
Nothing against them, just want to see how they turn out first. This guy, three years sober, sat down and wrote this book without any background by observing most of the people who were drinking. And they had very, very few. Just stop and think. If you had to go to a meeting, and every time they went to a meeting, they had a religious service there, wouldn't you? You'd be turned off pretty bad. They really had to be dedicated.
In fact, this is amazing. Let me tell you. In 1963, I was in New York working for a company in Los Angeles. And I thought, I'll go and see Bill Wilson. I'd heard him talk at the convention, but I'd never met him. So I went over to the World Service Office on 44th Street at that time, 45th. And as I was talking to Bill Wilson, oh, you have to have an appointment to talk to him. He's booked up for weeks in advance. Maybe next time you're in New York, we can make a reservation. I said, OK. So I wandered into the archives, and I was leafing through old stuff. And all of a sudden, here comes Bill Wilson. He says, are you the young man who wanted to see me? I said, yeah, I did. He said, well, my 11 o'clock just canceled out. Come on in. So we sat and talked for an hour.
And I'm sorry to tell you that I'm afraid I did most of the talking, because I was so excited in telling him all the things that had happened to me. I just got my front teeth back recently. And I was working as a director of advertising for a big medical corporation. But one of the things I remember most clearly, I said, you know, Bill, we have a book study in Los Angeles. And last couple of weeks ago, we were working with others. And I said, you know, it's a funny thing in that book. You don't want to take people to meetings. You never suggest taking. You tell them how to identify yourself, how to show that you're like them, how similar you are, what drinking is on. But in Los Angeles, God, we take people to meetings all the time. He said, young man, when I wrote that book, there were no meetings, just the Oxford group. And you had to sell them on the outside when you went for coffee or whatever the hell it might be. Really tough.
But that book became a miracle. You know why it's a miracle? That is inexplicable. This book, with its flaws and faults and all the things in it, has changed more alcoholics of our type in the last 70 years than all other therapies combined in the history of mankind. That is a miracle. That's an inexplicable miracle. Then they went along. You know the story, how Lois Wilson's cousin was an aide to Rockefeller.
They got a deal set up to have a dinner where you're going to get some money. And Rockefeller didn't give him any money. Said, don't spoil your organization. They didn't see it that way. In 1939, there was a little magazine called Liberty. They got to write a little article about it. Somebody wrote an article in there about AA, this new thing. And they made it sound like a complete religion. And it just turned people off. It just was an anti-AA talk.
An anti-AA talk. At the end of 1940, the Saturday Evening Post had a writer who specialized in
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uncovering corruption. He had just written an award-winning series about the corruption of the Philadelphia Labor Union on the docks of Philadelphia. His next assignment, work your way into this AA scam and give us a burn list, turn them on. So he got around, and he couldn't believe what he found. They're doing what they said they were. Nobody's making any money. He went to St. Louis. There's a little group there. Chicago and Los Angeles.
Not one person. And he was so astonished that he wrote an article, and most of us are familiar with that, published in Saturday Evening Post, 1941, about how alcoholics of this type are finding a way to stay sober. And he gave an address in New York, and New York was inundated by mail. Because in every state, in every city, there were people who had alcoholics of that type driving them crazy. And maybe there's an answer before they make us crazy.
And what he would do is send them a book and give them a little notice on how to start a meeting, maybe, and just all over there, boom, boom, boom, boom. Really great. By 1942, AA was a lot of places in the country. Then by 1943, he started getting letters, our group is dying out. We're trying to follow the steps, but our group is dying out. And people were arguing and fighting and debating how to do things. And by 1944, it really started to pick up speed. The groups were going down. Bill Wilson, in an effort to save AA, he thought it would help.
He started the Grapevine. It's a tabloid like this. And he put it out, but it didn't help much. In 1950, 1945, AA was on their way to extinction. And a guy, a doctor in North Carolina, wrote an article for the Grapevine. He said, Bill, I don't know if you're familiar with this, but here's something interesting. He sent in an article about a group very similar to AA, just a hundred years before. It started with six drunks in Baltimore. One had just got out of jail, and he's back, he's that damn chaplain said he knows how I feel. He didn't know how I feel.
You guys are the only guys who know how I feel, and you can't stay sober either. So they took a vow. We'll help each other stay sober. When somebody wants to drink, the other five will talk to them. They drew up a constitution, one page, elected officers, five officers, one member. And they named themselves after George Washington, because they thought that'd be American. The Washingtonians. And everybody's, you drunken pukes, you can't keep yourself sober. What kind of a joke is this? But they stayed sober, these six goofs. And they had a couple more. Then somebody came down from Philadelphia and saw what they were doing and went back to Philadelphia and started one.
And they started one in Washington, and they started one in Boston, but it really took off. And they were doing really well. They had a couple hundred after a year. And then in the second year, they really took off, because the entertainment in those years, there's no TV or movies or anything, mostly public gatherings where they'd have speakers come in, or somebody entertaining and talk, and they got a couple of these spellbinders into the Washingtonians. And they began talking up the Washingtonians in their talks, and they just started getting flooded with members, because alcoholism in those years was the worst alcoholic period of America, for some reason in the 1840s.
And by 1843, at the end of their second year, they were doing well. In fact, a lot of people still thought they were crackpots. So they sent out a letter to every chapter that you could know or heard about, and said, a lot of people don't know what we're doing. On our second birthday, which we're going to take Washington's birthday as our birthday, we're a little week off, have somebody from your community come in and give a little talk. We don't care what they say. We want them to see that we're pretty straight shooters, and we're doing good. So all over the country, February 22nd, 1842, in Springfield, Illinois, they had a young lawyer named Abraham Lincoln who came in and talked. If you ever read a book of Lincoln speeches, you find one to the Washingtonians, 1842. And most of it was just blah, blah, blah. But the end is very touching. He said, I know most of you men here. I worked with you. I understand you, but I do not understand your thirst. It baffles me, but I'm so happy that you are finding a way to quench it without drinking, and so on. And they continued to grow. By 1845, now just stop and think about this. By 1845, their membership was estimated at a hundred thousand.
AA, after five years with telephones and movies, had one thousand, less than one thousand. And they were the
[00:50:07]
most successful. They worked much like AA. Drinkers talking to drinkers. I know how you feel. And what happened is that their leaders got together and thought, we've really got the most successful thing in history here, but I think we're confining ourselves. We're able to help drunkards, but I think we should be able to help narcotics addicts who are not drunkards, not opium and cocaine and heroin like today, but laudanum and opium. We should help people who have emotional problems. We should get into politics and make sure the right people are elected. We should get involved in the anti-slavery movement, because that's the right thing to do. We should get involved in allowing Texas to become a state. A lot of things they got into, and they all went off in different directions and did wonderful things. And by 1848, the Washingtonians were extinct, and with very few exceptions, they all died drunk. I had a book home written in 1861 by one of the few members who still survives. I just can't tell what happened. We were doing so well, and we're all getting involved in things, but we never seem to have time to talk to drunkards anymore. Just one by one, people run away. I'll tell you how extinct they had been. Bill Wilson had never heard of them, the only successful program for dealing with alcoholics in the history of the world, and Bill Wilson never heard of them. So he went to the library and got some more books on them, and in 1945, using the Washingtonians as a template and the letters he was getting as a template, he sat down and in a desperate attempt to save Alcoholics Anonymous, wrote the Twelve Traditions, long after A was founded. He wrote them in the long form, the back of the book, and he issued them one by one in the grapevine. And Alcoholics Anonymous had a problem then that they have now, which is very difficult to overcome. It's full of alcoholics, and most of the people didn't want the traditions. We don't want any goddamn rules! We're here for love! And he had a lot of heat about it. Bill Wilson would jump on his motorcycle. In fact, his picture's over there somewhere on his motorcycle. Put her in the sidecar and go around to the meetings trying to explain, we're trying to save AA, this is not rules. In fact, when I was going through the archives one time in the World Service Office, I saw a letter there from some group written in 18, I don't know, maybe 50, 46, or 47, saying, Bill, we want you to come to speak at our second anniversary. Unless you're going to talk about the traditions, then don't come. We'd want to hear it. I mean, it sounds funny now, but it wasn't funny then. Brutal. And Bill and Dr. Bob were very concerned because AA was starting to come back, but it's very, very weak.
And so they decided, they told their followers, find a place where we can have a meeting, just one meeting of people from all over Los Angeles and Houston and Dallas and Chicago and everywhere, and explain what these traditions are about. So the people in Akron, who did not like the people in New York, and still don't, said, we'll go to a meeting, we won't go to New York. And the people in New York, not to be outdone in spirituality, we'll go to a meeting, we won't go to Akron. So Bill and Dr. Bob, their followers didn't get to, but they did. They got together in Cleveland. So in July of 1950, the first large group of sober alcoholics of our type in the history of the world sat down in Cleveland. I have the tapes of that convention. The goodness of the tape itself is not very much, but the content is great. And they had mostly, mostly non-alcoholic speakers, because they were still trying to convince people they were not goofy. They had the warden, the San Quentin, they had the government people, a lot of people. Bill and Dr. Bob each gave a talk at that convention. And, you know, Dr. Bob was dying of cancer. I said, you probably don't want to talk, Bob. He said, oh, I've got to talk. I've got 15 years sober. That's the second longest sobriety in the world. So on that day, the son on one side and a friend on the other, took this tall, gaunt man up to the podium. He said, I'm so glad to see you here. I hope you'll go back and tell the boys and girls in your group what we're doing, that we all get out of it, what we put into it. And he went on to say, as I look over this vast assemblage, I'm glad some small thing I did 15 years ago helped bring this about. I want to apologize for my health. I
[00:55:03]
haven't been in bed most of the past few months. I haven't recovered as well as I thought. You know, just prattle almost. But then he said, I do want to call your attention to one or two things that may be of interest. And then he gave what many people construe to be the Gettysburg Address of Alcoholics Anonymous. Because he was always a better 12-stepper. He always did much better with newcomers than Bill did. He was much more empathetic. And he was a great communicator. And this was like a, he knew he was dying, so it was like a deathbed confession or a deathbed admonition, probably. He said, first, let us remember to keep our program simple. Let us not louse it all up with Freudian complexes, which may be of interest to the scientific mind, but has nothing to do with our work here. Our work here, when reduced to the last, consists of love and service. And we all know what love is. And we all know what service is. And secondly, he said, let us guard that erring member, the tongue, and try to use it with kindness and understanding. And there isn't a person in this room or any room likely in the world who doesn't know exactly what he's talking about. We're all wonderful when things are going our way. Love is the answer, baby. A is my home. Let somebody hurt my feelings. Somebody make me look bad. Until you give me the ultimate curse. I don't even think that son of a bitch is an alcoholic. Isn't that funny? We spent our whole lives fighting that term. And then the worst thing we can say about someone, you're not an alcoholic. Yes, I am. I'll prove I am.
And finally, he said, none of us would be here today if someone hadn't taken the time to explain things to us, to give us a pat on the back when we needed it, to take us to a few meetings. Let us never reach that stage of smug complacency where we no longer have time to help our fellow brother who struggled to the depth of alcoholic despair. And he sat down and was dead shortly thereafter. Incidentally, a funny little anecdote about that. After that, it went so well, they decided to have another convention in St.
Louis, one more. That went so well, they decided to have another one in Los Angeles at Long Beach. And that's where the five-year conventions come from. But it got to be a custom for Bill Wilson to speak on Friday night. Dr. Bob didn't speak because he died in 1950. I heard him speak. I was thrilled to hear him speak in 1960 at Long Beach. I heard him speak in Denver in 1965. 1970, Miami Beach. God, Bill's going to be talking. Just such a sense of excitement. Can you imagine? The opening meeting and about 10,000 people in the Miami Convention Center. You could cut the excitement with a knife. The guy said, I am sorry to report that Bill is too ill to talk. What's that?
We didn't know he was dying. He was dying. We didn't know that from emphasy. He said, I'm sorry. And just like an air went out of a balloon. Oh, Jesus. He said, we have a substitute speaker. And who's this poor guy? We want to hear Bill. On the way after the meeting, we're walking back to the hotel. I walked into an old guy named John McHugh, old-timer from Pittsburgh. I said, isn't that too bad, John? We'll never hear Bill talk again. He said, no, he'll talk at this convention. I said, no, he won't. I talked to people from the New York office. They said, he's dying of emphysema. He can't talk. He'll talk.
I said, I think you're crazy, John. Well, maybe he knows somebody else. Saturday night, that meeting, no, regular speaker. Sunday morning, last chance, regular speaker came out, gave a talk. Ha, so much for John. But right halfway through his talk, he turned to me. I have some wonderful news. An ambulance has just brought Bill to the back door. He wants to say a few words. And they wheeled him in a wheelchair with tubes out of his nose. Everybody jumped up, and the organist played Climb Every Mountain. God, it makes me excited to think about it.
And he pulled himself to the mic. My dear friends, he said, we're glad you're well. We'll get as much out of it as we put into it. We'll do God's work as long as God wills. to Do It, We'll Do God's Work as Long as God Wants Us to Do It. Then Sonic the Tape Breaks and he fell, but he just fell out of air and they wheeled him out. And he was dead shortly thereafter. I said to John, I said, How in the hell did you know he was going
[01:00:02]
to talk? He said, Kid, you got to remember, you're dealing with human beings. They may be inspired human beings, but they're human beings. Do you think Bill Wilson would want it said that Dr. Bob talked while he was dying and Bill refused? No, guys. But at that convention, they had six young guys. I don't know who they were, but on the tape they could just hear their tails wagging, just enthusiastic. Each of them took two long forms of the traditions, two traditions long form, and they read them. And some of you may not be familiar with the long form. You ought to read them because they really flesh out what it's about here. For example, in the third step, other things, which you'll hear about later this weekend. But they just read them and they're just so excited. You know, we're not, these are just traditions. These are suggestions. We have no way to enforce them. We have no AA police. We're just, love is the… I've heard that and I think maybe one little mistake in there. Wouldn't it be nice to have AA police? In my hometown, even though it's absolutely unfair, I've been known as a dictator type sponsor. My sponsor Chuck Chamberlain used to say, you don't share, you tell people. But keep doing it because it's working. But people never seem to realize you can't be a dictator type sponsor without the absolute permission of the dictatee. All he has to say is screw you and the dictatorship is over. It would be nice if we had people could come at night and say, did you say screw you to your sponsor? Come with us to the camp. Might add a little love. But little by little AA grew. Most of us know the current history of AA. It's now in 134 countries. I'll tell you what's remarkable about that. In the last few years, I've had the opportunity because I've been sober so long and active that I've been asked to do some exotic things. I speak in Cape Town and earlier this year in Bangkok and Bali and all over Australia and New Zealand.
We have some people here from New Zealand I met when I was talking down there. And all over Ireland, England, all over Scandinavia. And you'd really think you'd find exotic AA in these places. But except for the accents, you hear the same emotions that Dr. Bob talked about in 1935. Some people not feeling they're alcoholic because their case is different. My emotions are what's wrong. It's not the drinking drink is my friend. On and on and other people say, here's what you do to overcome that feeling. And incidentally, as Charlie said tonight, this book, sometimes this book gets kind of badly used because they think if you read it and memorize, you'll stay sober. Not true. Not true at all. What this book is in effect is an emotional cookbook. It has recipes, what to do. And you can memorize every one of them and get drunk. Just like you can memorize a cookbook. I know every recipe in there. Why am I starving? Because you haven't cooked the god damn things. Oh, they talk about big book thumpers. I don't think they worry about big book thumpers who are doing it. They're talking about big book thumpers, Charlie, who are not doing it. I saw that on page XVIII. Or someplace else, I don't know where. But just stop and think all the little things all the way back. If Dr. Jung had taken him back in, we wouldn't be here. If the Oxford group, if he hadn't taken to the Oxford group, we wouldn't be here. If he'd been up in Vermont a week after Ebbie went to the penitentiary, we wouldn't be here. If Bill Wilson had got so sick, we wouldn't be here. On and on. The day in Akron, all those phone calls, everybody had to be on that phone and answering it because if one missed, we were gone. Norm Alp used to say seconds and inches talking about his life.
And that's the way it is with all of our lives. Our lives are here for a series of seconds and inches. But just think the overall, the two and a half million of us are here only because of seconds and inches. We could make a case for it and say we hardly deserve it. And yet the biggest battle we have, after we're sober a while, is not to take it all
[01:05:00]
for granted and say, what's the big deal? It's a big deal. It was a big deal for them. It's a big deal for you and me. I know I slept for 10 years in AA. And when I finally stayed sober, I was very enthusiastic. And a couple of months ago, I turned 51 years. And I'm still enthusiastic because I stop and think, I take it for granted sometimes I work in the middle of skid rows, drab and people dying around me. It's not much fun. But when I really think about it, I've been given an opportunity. You've been given an opportunity. A lot of people have been given this opportunity and they're dying on the street. But we are here.
For Christ's sake, let's stay here.