It seemed to be getting a little too technical and detailed. Sometimes I felt like they were using a Ouija board. Me and some of the other alkies felt they put these things down on paper and it was their own personal idea for you. . . . But out of respect for T. Henry, we didn’t kick.
Newly sober drunks found it difficult to tolerate criticism of any kind, but criticism from nonalcoholics, even the constructive kind, was particularly hard to take.16
The alcoholic members of the Oxford Group in New York were the first to leave the group. They had been meeting separately for some time. At first, they gathered at a nearby cafeteria following the meetings at the Calvary Church. Later, they met on Tuesday evenings at the Wilsons’ home. By then, it was obvious to the nonalcoholic members of the Oxford Group that Wilson was spending all of his time recruiting alcoholics instead of the social leaders whose support would help the group expand. The Reverend Sam Shoemaker, the pastor of the Calvary Church, was a leader of the Oxford Group in America who had become a good friend of Wilson’s. But a young priest took advantage of Shoemaker’s absence on vacation to preach a sermon condemning the “divergent work” of a “secret, ashamed subgroup.” Drunks in the mission were told to stop attending the meetings at Wilson’s home. When Shoemaker was unable to repair the damage, Wilson and his friends left the Oxford Group in May 1937 and continued to meet in Brooklyn.17
A different problem troubled the Oxford Group meeting in Akron that was home to Bob Smith’s “alcoholic squadron.” Smith had no idea what a dynamo Clarence Snyder would become. Snyder was a born salesman, and he proved it by quickly making himself the top man at one of the largest Ford and Mercury dealerships in Ohio. No less impressive was his ability to sell drunks on sobriety. His first convert was a man he discovered in an abandoned house in a Polish section of Cleveland that was occupied by more than a dozen drunks. The man, Bill H., was lying paralyzed on the floor, but he told Snyder he wanted to get sober. A couple of drunks helped him get to Snyder’s car, and he was driven to Akron City Hospital, where he recovered his health.
Snyder and his wife, Dorothy, drove down to Akron every Wednesday to attend the Oxford Group meetings at T. Henry Williams’s home. The car quickly filled with drunks he had recruited in Cleveland. Soon, thirteen people were cramming into two cars. They called themselves the “Cleveland Contingent,” and they differed in important ways from the Akron alcoholics. There was a woman alcoholic among them—Sylvia K., who would become a founder of the first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting in Chicago. The Clevelanders also included the first Catholic members of the alcoholic squadron. A majority of them were Irish Americans.
Women alcoholics made the rest of the drunks nervous. The sad story of Lil, the first woman that Wilson and Smith had tried to help, convinced many that mixing the sexes was a threat to their sobriety. But it was the Catholic alcoholics who posed an immediate problem. While the Oxford Group claimed to be an ecumenical movement, its members were overwhelmingly Protestant. Their meetings featured readings from the King James Version of the Bible, which was used only in Protestant churches, and periods of “sharing” during which members were encouraged to admit their sins, which in Catholic churches occurred only in the confessional.
These aspects of the Oxford Group were enough to convince some priests in Cleveland that their alcoholic parishioners were participating in Protestant rituals that threatened their immortal souls. Snyder attempted to intercede with the priests, arguing that membership in the Oxford Group was helping their people stay sober and actually making them better Catholics. “The Church didn’t buy this line, not one bit,” Snyder said. When he took the problem to Smith, Dr. Bob saw only two alternatives. “Remain with the Oxford Group and probably risk excommunication, or, very simply leave the Church,” he said. If the Catholics wanted to stay sober, they had to be prepared to abandon their religion.18
Conflict was about to erupt in the Akron and New York groups. Wilson’s expansion plans had not made much progress by the spring of 1938. There was no money to pay missionaries, much less to open hospitals. The only project that was making progress was the “book of experience” that would describe how to get sober. Although he had never written a book, Wilson became the principal author. As he finished each chapter, he sent the draft to Smith, who shared it with members of the Akron group. Wilson read the chapters aloud during meetings of the New York group. It was a painful process. Nobody could argue much with Wilson’s story in the first chapter, but the New Yorkers had a lot to say about the next three. “[T]he chapters got a real mauling. I redictated them . . . over and over,” Wilson said. It took him six months to satisfy everyone.19
As he began outlining the fifth chapter, “How It Works,” he was dreading the reaction of the other alcoholics. It would be the most consequential part of the book. “[A]t this point we would have to tell how our program for recovery from alcoholism really worked,” Wilson said. The “program” would be the steps that Wilson and his friends had taken to get sober. Wilson wasn’t sure he could do it. “The hassling over the four chapters already finished had really been terrific. I was exhausted. On many a day I felt like throwing the book out the window,” he said.20
There was already a “word of mouth program” that was based on the four spiritual practices of the Oxford Group: making a “moral inventory” of your defects of character; sharing these shortcomings with another person; making restitution to those you had been harmed; and praying to God for the power to undertake these tasks. As Wilson lay in bed with a pencil and a pad of paper, these steps did not seem detailed enough for alcoholics. They would have to be clear enough to provide guidance to people in places where there were no members of the group to advise them. They would also need to be unequivocal. “There must not be a single loophole through which the rationalizing alcoholic could wiggle out,” Wilson said.21
“Finally, I started to write,” Wilson recalled. “I relaxed and asked for guidance.”
With a speed that was astonishing, considering my jangling emotions, I completed the first draft. It took perhaps a half an hour. The words kept right on coming. When I reached a stopping point, I numbered the new steps. They added up to 12. Somehow this number seemed significant. Without any special rhyme or reason I connected them with the 12 apostles. Feeling greatly relieved now, I commenced to reread the draft.
Here is Wilson’s first draft of the twelve steps:
1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that God could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our wills and our lives over to the care and direction of God.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely willing that God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly on our knees asked Him to remove these shortcomings—holding nothing back.
8. Made a complete list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10.Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11.Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our contact with God, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12.Having had a spiritual experience as the result of this course of action, we tried to carry this message to others, especially alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.22
“I was greatly pleased with what I had written,” Wilson said.23
For a moment, he allowed himself to believe that he had described a program that was unassailable, if not God given. Wilson’s happiness was short-lived. At that moment, he received a visit from Horace C. and another alcoholic who had been sober for only a few
months. Wilson read his work to them and waited for their applause. He was shocked by their response:
[Horace] and his friend reacted violently. “Why twelve steps?” they demanded. . . .“You’ve got too much God in these steps; you will scare people away.” And, “What do you mean by getting those drunks down ‘on their knees’ when they ask to have all their shortcomings removed?” And “Who wants all their shortcomings removed, anyhow?”
Seeing the disappointment in Wilson’s face, Horace acknowledged that “some of this stuff sounds pretty good,” but he didn’t back down. “Bill, you’ve got to tone it down. It’s too stiff,” he said. “The average alcoholic just won’t buy it the way it stands.” Wilson responded with a strenuous defense, insisting on the importance of every word. The debate went on for hours. Finally, Lois appeared and suggested they take a coffee break, which ended the discussion for the night.24
The debate over the twelve steps grew during the following weeks. Horace and his friend were right: Wilson had talked about God a lot. God was also mentioned frequently in the chapters that Wilson had already written. While Akron members were generally supportive, the issue divided the New Yorkers into three groups that Wilson later identified as “conservatives,” “liberals,” and “radicals.” Fitz M., the son of a minister, wanted to go even further in identifying the group as religious. He believed that the book should declare its allegiance to Christian principles, “using Biblical terms and expression to make this clear,” Wilson said. The liberals had no objection to the use of the word “God” throughout the book, but they were adamantly opposed to identifying their movement with a particular religion. In their view, the religious missions had failed because drunks were unwilling to accept their beliefs.25
Wilson described the third group as “our radical left wing.” At least one member, James Burwell, was an outspoken atheist. The others were either agnostics or believers who nevertheless opposed any mention of God. Henry Parkhurst had been among the first to see the importance of the book and had developed the fund-raising plan that would make its publication possible. He was also one of the first to express the view that religion should be downplayed. In part, this was an expression of his own religious doubts. But it was also a question of marketing. In a memo about “sales promotion, possibilities,” he expressed concern about alienating the customers:
One of the things most talked about . . . among us is religious experience. I believe this is incomprehensible to most people. Simple and meaning [sic] words to us—but meaningless to most of the people that we are trying to get this over to. . . . I am fearfully afraid that we are emphasizing religious experience when that is actually something that follows.
Wilson was shocked. “What Henry, Jimmy, and company wanted was a psychological book which would lure the alcoholic in. Once in, the prospect could take God or leave him alone,” he said.26
The debate at the New York meeting continued into 1939. In the meantime, members in both Akron and New York were working to address another criticism of Wilson’s draft. There was general agreement that it did not contain enough “evidence in the form of living proof” to convince drunks that they could quit. To meet this need, twenty-eight members contributed short stories describing their experience to a section at the end of the book. The debate over religion was still under way as the final stories were received. To end the impasse, it was agreed that Wilson would be the final judge of what the book said. At the end of January, four hundred copies of the manuscript were sent out for comments from doctors, religious leaders, and others in an effort to identify any problems prior to publication.
The religious debate wasn’t over. Shortly before the book was sent to the printer, Parkhurst pushed his argument one last time. He had been sharing his Newark office with Wilson. It was where Wilson had dictated most of the book to a secretary, Ruth Houck. Fitz, who favored a more religious book, was also present. Parkhurst wanted changes in the twelve steps, something Wilson had been refusing to consider. “He argued, he begged, he threatened,” Wilson said. “He was positive we would scare off alcoholics by the thousands when they read those 12 Steps.” Houck, who was not an alcoholic, was the easiest to persuade. Then, Fitz began to soften. Finally, Wilson agreed to make several changes:
In Step Two we decided to describe God as a “Power greater than ourselves.” In Steps Three and Eleven we inserted the words “God as we understood Him.” From Step Seven we deleted the expression “on our knees.” And, as a lead-in sentence to all the steps we wrote these words: “Here are the steps we took which are suggested as a Program of Recovery.” A.A.’s Twelve Steps were to be suggestions only.
While the changes made by altering a few words appeared superficial at first, Wilson later acknowledged that the radicals had secured their major objective. “They had widened our gateway so that all who suffer might pass through regardless of their belief or lack of belief,” he said.27
One additional change in the manuscript underlined the commitment to inclusiveness. A psychiatrist who had been asked to comment on the final draft thought the tone was often peremptory, addressing the reader as “you” and telling him what he “must” do. “He suggested that we substitute wherever possible such expression as “we ought” or “we should,” Wilson said. He briefly resisted making the change because it would require a lot of editing, but he finally agreed when other outside readers made the same point.28
Though Wilson was forced to make a lot of concessions in completing his book, he won a major victory when it was agreed that it would be titled Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How One Hundred Men Have Recovered from Alcoholism. A majority of the members had initially favored The Way Out, but a search of the titles copyrighted by the Library of Congress revealed that there were twelve books by that name. The manuscript was finally sent to the printer and was published in April 1939 by the Works Publishing Company, which had been organized by Wilson and Parkhurst. Five thousand copies of the four-hundred-page book were printed on thick paper to help justify its cost—$3.50. It was the bulkiness of the final product that led members to refer to it as the “Big Book.”
The publication of the Big Book had immediate consequences for the Cleveland alcoholics in the Akron group. Snyder had been urging Smith to do something to help the Catholic members. In the days after the release of Alcoholics Anonymous, Snyder approached Smith again and got the same answer:
“We’re not keeping the Catholics out—the church is keeping them out. . . . We can’t do anything about it.”
“Yes, we can,” Clarence said.
“What do you have in mind?”
“To start a group without all this rigmarole that’s offensive to other people. We have a book now, the Steps, the absolutes. Anyone can live by that program. We can start our own meetings.”
“We can’t abandon these people,” Doc replied. “We owe our lives to them.”
“So what?” Clarence replied. “I owe my life to them, too. But what about all these others?”
“We can’t do anything about them,” Doc said.
“Oh, yes, we can. . . . You’ll see.”
Snyder had recently helped hospitalize a Cleveland patent attorney named Abby G. While Abby was still in the hospital, Snyder told Abby’s wife that he was looking for a place to hold a meeting in Cleveland, and she had offered her own large home. In early May, Snyder announced at the Akron meeting that the Clevelanders were leaving the Oxford Group and would begin their own meeting the following week. “Our policy will be mainly this,” Snyder wrote Parkhurst a few weeks later. “Not too much stress on spiritual business at meetings.”29
Some Oxford Group members were outraged at what they saw as a betrayal. They attempted to argue with Snyder after his announcement. When he made the mistake of revealing the location of Abby’s home, some of them showed up at the first meeting to continue their protest. “They invaded the house and tried to break up our meeting,” Snyder said. “One fellow was going to whip me. All in the na
me of pure Christian love!”30
Smith stayed home. He quickly reconciled himself to the break and began attending the meeting once or twice a month. While he was reluctant to anger his close friends Henrietta Seiberling and T. Henry Williams, he understood the reasons for starting the group in Cleveland, which was soon describing itself as a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. By the end of the year, he was convinced that the Akron alcoholics, too, must find a new home. In December, as many as seventy people began cramming into the living room of the Smiths’ small home on Wednesday nights. “Have definitely thrown off the shackles of the Oxford Group,” he wrote Wilson on January 2, 1940. Alcoholics Anonymous had declared its independence.31
Free at last, Snyder threw himself into organizing AA in Cleveland. His wife, Dorothy, shared his missionary zeal:
I felt that nobody in Cleveland should be drunk—or anywhere in the world—as long as there was an A.A. So I was pounding the streets trying to show different bookstores the A.A. book. I went down to the public library and tried to get orders. Nobody would even listen to me, and they looked at me like I was Salvation Nell.
Other members worked on establishing an institutional base in Cleveland. The wife of one of the drunks was a nurse who had many contacts with hospital administrators. She suggested that the head of Deaconess Hospital might be willing to work with AA, providing the private rooms where the AA members could work with alcoholics. Smith and a local doctor who had only been sober for a few weeks persuaded the administrator to take the question to his board of trustees. Despite opposition by the medical staff, the trustees agreed, and Deaconess began accepting alcoholics without any guarantee of payment. The hospital was expecting only a handful of admissions, but in the fall of 1939, a series of stories in the Cleveland Plain Dealer produced a sudden boom in AA membership.32
Drunks Page 22