A Synopsis of AA

History of Alcoholics Anonymous
The history of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) has been documented in books, movies, and AA literature from its
founding in 1935 as a solution for alcoholism by Bill Wilson (known as Bill W.) and Dr. Robert Smith (known as
Dr. Bob), through early struggles and worldwide growth.[1]
Alcoholism in the 1930’s:

Public opinion in post-Prohibition 1930’s America saw alcoholism as a moral failing, and the medical profession
saw it as a condition that was incurable and lethal.[2] Those without financial resources found help through state
hospitals, the Salvation Army, and other charitable and religious groups. Those who could afford psychiatrists or
hospitals were subjected to a treatment with Barbiturate and Belladonna known as "purge and puke"[3] or were left
in long-term asylum treatment.
The Emmanuel Movement was founded in 1906 by Dr. Elwood Worcester and Dr. Samuel McComb in Boston's
Emmanuel Church, and in 1931 they published a book called “Mind, Body, and Spirit,” addressing the nature of
alcoholism.[4] The movement worked closely with the medical field and produced lay therapists that included
Courtney Baylor and Richard Peabody.[5] Peabody wrote The Common Sense of Drinking, and his ideas became
paralleled in what is called the Big Book.[6]
The Oxford Group:

The Oxford Group was a Christian Fellowship founded by American Christian missionary Dr. Franklin Nathaniel
Daniel Buchman. Buchman was a Lutheran minister who had a conversion experience in 1908 in a Chapel in
Keswick, England. As a result of that experience, in 1921 he founded a movement called “A First Century Christian
Fellowship,” which by 1931 became known as the “Oxford Group.” Buchman summed up the Group's philosophy in
a few sentences: all people are sinners, all sinners can be changed, confession is a prerequisite to change, the change
can access god directly, miracles are again possible, the change must change others.[7]
The practices they utilized were called The five C's: Confidence, Confession, Conviction, Conversion, Continuance.
Their standard of morality were the Four Absolutes as the summary of the Sermon on the Mount: Absolute-Honesty,
Absolute-Purity, Absolute-Unselfishness, and Absolute-Love.
The Oxford Group influenced the structure of Alcoholics Anonymous and many of the ideas that formed the
foundation of AA's suggested twelve-step program.[8][9] Later in life, Bill Wilson gave credit to the Oxford Group
for saving his life.[10]
An Oxford Group understanding of the human condition is evident in Wilson's formulation of the dilemma of the
alcoholic; Oxford programs for recovery and influences of Oxford evangelism can still be detected in key practices
of Alcoholics Anonymous.[11] The Oxford Group writers sometimes treated sin as a disease.[12] Sin was anything
that stood between the individual and God. Sin frustrated God's plan for oneself; selfishness and self-centeredness
were considered the key problem. Therefore, if one could surrender the ego to God, sin would go with it. In early
AA, Wilson spoke of sin and the need for a complete surrender. The Oxford Group also prided itself on being able
to help troubled persons at any time. AA gained an early warrant from the Oxford Group for the concept that disease
could be spiritual, but it broadened the diagnoses to include the physical as well as the spiritual and
psychological.[11]
In 1955 Wilson wrote, “The early AA got its ideas of self-examination, acknowledgment of character defects,
restitution for harm done, and working with others straight from the Oxford Group and directly from Sam
Shoemaker (their former leader in America), and from nowhere else."[13] According to Mercadante, however, the
AA concept of powerlessness departs significantly from Oxford Group belief. In AA the bondage of an addictive
disease cannot be cured, while the Oxford Group stressed the possibility of complete victory over sin.[11]
In 1931 an American business executive, Rowland Hazard, sought treatment for alcoholism with psychiatrist Carl
Jung in Switzerland. Jung, who broke away from Freudian psychoanalysis, coined the term synchronicity for
"meaningful coincidences" that happen in life. Common references in AA deal with "Spiritual Awakenings" and
"Spiritual Experience." When Hazard ended treatment with Jung after about a year, he soon resumed drinking and
returned for further treatment. Jung told Hazard that his case was nearly hopeless (as with other alcoholics) and that
his only hope might be a spiritual conversion with a religious group.[14][15][16]
Back in America, Hazard went to a Oxford Group meeting in NY, from which the source of such AA concepts as
meetings and sharing witness(public confession), finding a higher power, making restitution, and rigorous honesty.
Hazard underwent a spiritual conversion with the help of the group and began to experience the liberation from
drink he was seeking and became converted and cold-sober on a train ride from NY to Detroit after reading "For
Sinners Only" by AJ Russell and finally achieved sobriety.[17][18]
Members of the group introduced Hazard to Ebby Thacher. Hazard brought Thacher to the Calvary Rescue Mission,
led by Oxford leader Dr. Sam Shoemaker.[19] Over the years, the Mission had helped over 200,000 needy
people.[20] Thacher also attained periodic sobriety in later years and died sober.[21] In keeping with Oxford
teaching that a new convert must win other converts to preserve his own conversion experience, Thacher contacted
his old friend Bill Wilson, who he knew still had a drinking problem.[20][22]
1934 Bill Wilson sober:

Bill Wilson was an alcoholic who had seen a promising career on Wall Street ruined by his drinking. He also failed
to graduate from law school because he was too drunk to pick up his diploma. His drinking damaged his marriage,
and he was hospitalized for alcoholism at Towns Hospital four times in 1933-1934 under the care of Dr. William
Silkworth. On Wilson's first stay at Towns Hospital, Dr. Silkworth explained to him his theory that alcoholism is an
illness rather than a moral failure or failure of willpower. Silkworth believed that alcoholics were suffering from a
mental obsession, combined with an allergy that made compulsive drinking inevitable, and to break the cycle one
had to completely abstain from alcohol use. Wilson was elated to find that he suffered from an illness, and he
managed to stay off alcohol for a month before he resumed drinking.[23]
When Ebby Thacher visited Wilson at his New York apartment and told him "he had got religion," Wilson's heart
sank.[24] Until then, Wilson had struggled with the existence of God, but of his meeting with Thacher he wrote,
“My friend suggested what then seemed a novel idea. He said, 'Why don't you choose your own conception of God?'
That statement hit me hard. It melted the icy intellectual mountain in whose shadow I had lived and shivered many
years. I stood in the sunlight at last."[25] When Thacher left, Wilson continued to drink. Thacher returned a few
days later bringing with him Shep Cornell, another Oxford member who was aggressive in his tactics of promoting
the Oxford Program, but despite their efforts Wilson continued to drink.[26]
The next morning Wilson arrived at Calvary Rescue Mission in a drunken state looking for Thacher. Once there, he
attended his first Oxford Group meeting, where he answered the call to come to the altar and, along with other
penitents, gave his life to Christ. Wilson excitedly told his wife Lois about his spiritual progress, yet the next day he
drank again and a few days later readmitted himself to Towns Hospital for the fourth and last time.[27] While at
Towns Hospital under Silkworth's care, Wilson was administered a drug cure concocted by Charles B. Towns.
Known as the Belladonna Cure, it contained the compounds Belladonna and Hyoscyamus niger, which cause
hallucinations. It was while undergoing this treatment that Wilson experienced his "Hot Flash" spiritual
conversion.[28] While lying in bed depressed and despairing, Wilson cried out, “I'll do anything! Anything at all! If
there be a God, let Him show Himself!"[29] He then had the sensation of a bright light, a feeling of ecstasy, and a
new serenity. Wilson described his experience to Dr. Silkworth, who told him not to discount it.
Thacher visited Wilson at Towns Hospital and introduced him to the basic tenets of the Oxford Group and to the
book Varieties of Religious Experience (1902), by American psychologist and philosopher William James. Upon
reading the book, Wilson was later to state that the phrase "deflation at depth" leapt out at him from the page of
James's book; however, this phrase does not appear in the book. It was James's theory that spiritual transformations
come from calamities, and their source lies in pain and hopelessness. James's belief concerning alcoholism was that
the cure for dipsomania was “religiomania.”[30] Upon his release from the hospital on December 18, 1934, Wilson
moved from the Calvary Rescue Mission to the Oxford meetings at Calvary House. There Wilson socialized after
the meetings with other ex-drinking Oxfords and became interested in learning how to help other alcoholics achieve
sobriety.[31] It was during this time that Wilson went on a crusade to save alcoholics. Sources for his prospects were
the Calvary Rescue Mission and Towns Hospital. Of all the alcoholics Wilson tried to help, not one stayed
sober.[32]
1935 Dr. Bob sober:

Silkworth believed Wilson was making a mistake by telling new converts of his "Hot Flash" conversion and trying
to apply the Oxford Group's principles. He advised Wilson of the need to deflate the alcoholic. He told Wilson to
give them the medical business, and give it to them hard; tell them of the obsession that condemns them to drink and
the physical sensitivity that condemns them to go mad or die. If it comes from another alcoholic, it will break down
their egos. Only then could he use the other "medicine"--the ethical principles he had picked up from the Oxford
Groups.[33]
During a business venture in Akron, Ohio, Wilson was tempted to drink and realized he must talk to another
alcoholic to stay sober. He phoned local ministers to ask if they knew any alcoholics. Norman Sheppard directed
him to Oxford member Henrietta Seiberling, whose group had been trying to help a desperate alcoholic named Dr.
Bob Smith.
While he was a student, Smith started drinking heavily and almost failed to graduate from medical school because of
it. He opened a medical practice and married, but his drinking put his business and family life in jeopardy. For
seventeen years Smith's daily routine was to stay sober until the afternoon, get drunk, sleep, then take sedatives to
calm his morning jitters. Seiberling convinced Smith to talk with Wilson, but Smith insisted the meeting be limited
to fifteen minutes. Smith was so impressed with Wilson's knowledge of alcoholism and ability to share from his own
experience, however, that their discussion lasted six hours.
Wilson moved into Bob and Anne Smith's family home. There both men made plans to take their message of
recovery on the road. During this period, however, Smith returned to drinking while attending a medical convention.
During his stay at the Smiths' home, Wilson joined Smith and his wife in the Oxford Group's practice of morning
guidance sessions with meditations and Bible readings. The Bible's “Book of James” became an important
inspiration for Smith and the alcoholics of the Akron group.[34] Wilson spent a month working with Smith, and
Smith became the first alcoholic Wilson brought to sobriety.[13] Smith's last drink was on June 10, 1935 (a beer to
steady his hand for surgery), and this is considered by members to be the founding date of AA.[35]
A new program:
Wilson and Smith sought to develop a simple program to help even the worst alcoholics, along with a more
successful approach that empathized with alcoholics yet convinced them of their hopelessness and powerlessness.
They believed active alcoholics were in a state of insanity rather than a state of sin, an idea they developed
independently of the Oxford Group.[36][37]
To produce a spiritual conversion necessary for sobriety and sanity, alcoholics needed to realize that they couldn't
conquer alcoholism by themselves—that surrendering to a higher power and working with another alcoholic were
required. Sober alcoholics could show drinking alcoholics that it was possible to enjoy life without alcohol, thus
inspiring a spiritual conversion that would help ensure sobriety.[37][38][39]
The tactic employed by Smith and Wilson to bring about the conversion was first to determine if an individual had a
drinking problem. To do this they would first approach the man's wife, and later they would approach the individual
directly by going to his home or by inviting him to the Smiths' home. The objective was to get the man to surrender,
and the surrender involved a confession of powerlessness and a prayer that said the man believed in a higher power
and could be restored to sanity. This process would sometimes take place in the kitchen, or at other times it was at
the man's bed with Wilson kneeling on one side of the bed and Smith on the other side. This way the man would be
led to admit his defeat. Wilson and Smith believed that until a man had surrendered, he couldn't attend the Oxford
meetings. No one was allowed to attend a meeting without being sponsored. Thus a new prospect underwent many
visits around the clock with members of the Akron team and undertook many prayer sessions, as well as listening to
Dr. Smith cite the medical facts about alcoholism. A new prospect was also put on a special diet of sauerkraut,
tomatoes and Karo syrup to reduce his alcoholic cravings. The Smith family home in Akron became a center for
alcoholics.[40]
Two realizations came from Wilson's work in Akron. The first was that to remain sober, an alcoholic needed another
alcoholic to work with. The second was the concept of the 24 hours—that if the alcoholic could resist the urge to
drink by postponing it for one day, one hour, or even one minute, he could remain sober.[41]
An Akron group and a New York group:

After he and Smith worked with AA members three and four, Bill Dotson and Ernie G., and an initial Akron group
was established, Wilson returned to New York and began hosting meetings in his home in the fall of 1935.
Wilson allowed alcoholics to live in his home for long periods without paying rent and board. This practice of
providing a “halfway house” was started by Dr. Bob Smith and his wife Anne.[42] Wilson's wife, Lois, not only
worked at a department store and supported Wilson and his non-paying guests, but she also did all the cooking and
cleaning. She also tried to help many of the alcoholics that came to live with them. She was attacked by one man
with a kitchen knife after she refused his advances, and another man committed suicide by gassing himself on their
premises. Later they found that he had stolen and sold off their best clothes. Wilson stopped the practice in 1936
when he saw that it did little to help alcoholics recover.[32][43] The Wilsons did not become disillusioned with the
Oxford Group until later; they attended the Oxford Group meetings at the Calvary Church on a regular basis and
went to a number of the Oxford Group house parties up until 1937.[44]
Separating from the Oxford Group:
There were two programs operating at this time, one in Akron and the other in New York. The Akron Oxford Group
and the New York Oxford Group had two very different attitudes toward the alcoholics in their midst. The Akron
Oxford members welcomed alcoholics into their group and did not use them to attract new members, nor did they
urge new members to quit smoking; and Akron's alcoholics did not meet separately from the Oxford Group.
The Wilsons' practice of hosting meetings solely for alcoholics, separate from the general Oxford Group meetings,
generated criticism within the New York Oxford Group. Oxford Group members believed the Wilsons' sole focus on
alcoholics caused them to ignore what else they could be doing for the Oxford Group. While Sam Shoemaker was
on vacation, members of the Oxford Group declared the Wilsons not "Maximum," and members were advised not to
attend the Wilsons' meetings.
In 1937 the Wilsons broke with the Oxford Group. The Oxford Group saw Wilson as quitting; Lois Wilson said they
"were kicked out." Wilson later wrote that he found the Oxford Group aggressive in their evangelism. He objected
to the group's publicity-seeking and intolerance of nonbelievers, and those alcoholics who were practicing Catholics
found their views to be in conflict with the Oxford teachings. On a personal level, while Wilson was in the Oxford
Group he was constantly checked by its members for his smoking and womanizing. The alcoholics within the Akron
group did not break away from the Oxford Group there until 1939. Their break was not from a need to be free of the
Oxford Group, it was an action taken to show solidarity with their brethren in New York.[45][46]
At the end of 1937, after the New York separation from the Oxford Group, Wilson returned to Akron, where he and
Smith calculated their early success rate to be about 5 percent.[47] Over 40 alcoholics in Akron and New York had
remained sober since they began their work. Wilson then made plans to finance and implement his program on a
mass scale, which included publishing a book, employing paid missionaries, and opening alcoholic treatment
centers. The 18 alcoholic members of the Akron group saw little need for paid employees, missionaries, hospitals or
separate literature. Some of what Wilson proposed violated the spiritual principles they were practicing in the
Oxford Group. By a one-vote margin, they agreed to Wilson's writing a book, but they refused any financial support
of his venture.[46][48]
1939 The Big Book:

The book's title is Alcoholics Anonymous, but it is referred to by AA members as the Big Book. Its main objective
is to help the alcoholic find a power greater than himself that will solve his problem;[49] the "problem" was an
inability to stay sober on his or her own. One of the main reasons the book was written was to provide an
inexpensive way to get the AA program of recovery to suffering alcoholics.
In the early days of AA, after the new program ideas were agreed to by Bill Wilson, Dr. Bob Smith and the majority
of AA members, they envisioned paid AA missionaries and free, or inexpensive, treatment centers. But initial
fundraising efforts failed.
Rockefeller:
In 1938, Bill Wilson's brother-in-law Leonard Strong contacted Willard Richardson, who arranged for a meeting
with A. Leroy Chapman, an assistant for John D. Rockefeller Jr. Wilson envisioned receiving millions of dollars to
fund AA missionaries and treatment centers, but Rockefeller refused, saying money would spoil things. Instead, he
agreed to contribute $5,000 in $30 weekly increments for Wilson and Smith to use for personal expenses.[50][51]
Later, in 1940, Rockefeller also held a dinner for AA that was presided over by his son Nelson and was attended by
wealthy New Yorkers, as well as members of the newly founded AA. Wilson hoped the event would raise much
money for the group, but upon conclusion of the dinner, Nelson stated that Alcoholics Anonymous should be
financially self-supporting and that the power of AA should lie in one man carrying the message to the next; it
would not lie with financial reward but only with the goodwill of its supporters.[52]
Although Wilson would later give Rockefeller credit for the idea of AA being nonprofessional, he was initially
disappointed with this consistent position; after the first Rockefeller fundraising attempt fell short, he abandoned
plans for paid missionaries and treatment centers. Instead, Wilson and Smith formed a nonprofit group called the
“Alcoholic Foundation” and published a book that shared their personal experiences and what they did to stay
sober.[53] The book they wrote, “Alcoholics Anonymous “(the Big Book), is the basic text for AA on how to stay
sober.
Works Publishing:
Wilson began work on the book, and as financial difficulties were encountered, the first two chapters, "Bill's Story"
and "There Is a Solution," were printed to help raise money. After receiving an offer from Harper & Brothers to
publish the book, early New York member Hank P., whose story "The Unbeliever" appears in the first edition of the
Big Book, convinced Wilson they should retain control over the book by publishing it themselves. Hank devised a
plan to form “Works Publishing, Inc.,” and raise capital by selling its shares to group members and friends. With
Wilson's knowledge as a stockbroker, Hank issued stock certificates, although the company was never incorporated
and had no assets.[54]
At first there was no success in selling the shares, but eventually Wilson and Hank obtained what they considered to
be a promise from Reader's Digest to do a story about the book once it was completed. On the strength of that
promise, AA members and friends were persuaded to buy shares, and Wilson received enough financing to continue
writing the book.[55] The editor of Reader's Digest claimed not to remember the promise, and the article was never
published.[56]
Bill and Hank held two-thirds of 600 company shares, and Ruth Hock also received some for pay as secretary. Two
hundred shares were sold for $5,000 ($79,000 in 2008 dollar value)[57] at $25 each ($395 in 2008 value), and they
received a loan from Charlie Towns for $2,500 ($40,000 in 2008 value). This only financed writing costs,[58] and
printing would be an additional 35 cents each for the original 5,000 books.[59] Edward Blackwell at Cornwall Press
agreed to print the book with an initial $500 payment, along with a promise from Bill and Hank to pay the rest
later.[60]
Hank P. returned to drinking after four years of sobriety and could not account for Works Publishing's assets. Hank
blamed Wilson for this, along with his own personal problems. By 1940, Wilson and the Trustees of the Foundation
decided that the Big Book should belong to AA, so they issued some preferred shares, and with a loan from the
Rockefellers they were able to call in the original shares at par value of $25 each. Hank P. initially refused to sell his
200 shares, then later showed up at Wilson's office broke and shaky. Wilson offered Hank $200 for the office
furniture that belonged to Hank, provided he sign over his shares. Hank agreed to the arrangement after some
prodding from Wilson. Not long after this, Wilson was granted a royalty agreement on the book that was similar to
what Dr. Bob received at an earlier date. The transaction left Hank resentful, and later he accused Wilson of
profiting from Big Book royalties, something that Cleveland group founder Clarence S. also seriously questioned.
Using principles he had learned from the Oxford Group, Wilson tried to remain cordial and supportive to both
men.[61][62] Works Publishing became incorporated on June 30, 1940.[63]
Twelve Steps:
After the third and fourth chapters of the Big Book were completed, Wilson decided that a summary of methods for
treating alcoholism was needed to describe their "word of mouth" program.[64] The basic program had developed
from the works of William James, Dr. Silkworth, and the Oxford Group. It included six basic steps:
1. We admitted that we were “licked,” that we were powerless over alcohol.

2. We made a moral inventory of our defects or sins.
3. We confessed or shared our shortcomings with another person in confidence.
4. We made restitution to all those we had harmed by our drinking.
5. We tried to help other alcoholics, with no thought of reward in money or prestige.
6. We prayed to “whatever God we thought there was” for power to practice these precepts.
Wilson decided that the six steps needed to be broken down into smaller sections to make them easier to understand
and accept.[64] He wrote the Twelve Steps one night while lying in bed, which he felt was the best place to think.
He prayed for guidance prior to writing, and in reviewing what he had written and numbering the new steps, he
found they added up to twelve. He then thought of the Twelve Apostles and became convinced that the program
should have twelve steps.[65] With contributions from other group members, including atheists who reined in
religious content (such as Oxford material) that could later result in controversy, by fall 1938 Wilson expanded the
six steps into the final version of the Twelve Steps, which are detailed in Chapter Five of the Big Book, called "How
It Works."[66] Many of the chapters in the Big Book were written by Wilson, including Chapter 8, "To Wives." It
was a chapter he had offered to Dr. Bob's wife, Anne Smith, to write, but she declined. His wife Lois had wanted to
write the chapter, and his refusal to allow her left her angry and hurt. The chapter appears to hold the wife
responsible for her alcoholic husband's emotional stability once he has quit drinking.[67] Wilson kept track of the
people whose personal stories were featured in the first edition of the Big Book. About 50 percent of them had not
remained sober.[68]
Promotion:
Initially the Big Book did not sell. Five thousand copies sat in the warehouse, and Works Publishing was nearly
bankrupt. Morgan R., recently released from an asylum, contacted his friend Gabriel Heatter, host of popular radio
program, “We the People,” to promote his newly found recovery through AA. The interview was considered vital to
the success of AA and its book sales, so to ensure that Morgan stayed sober for the broadcast, members of AA kept
him locked in a hotel room for several days under a 24-hour watch. The interview was a success, and Hank P.
arranged for 20,000 postcards to be mailed to doctors announcing the Heatter broadcast and encouraging them to
buy a copy of Alcoholics Anonymous.[69] Book sales and AA popularity also increased after positive articles in
Liberty magazine in 1939[70] and the Saturday Evening Post in 1941.[71]
Revisions:
The second edition was released in 1955, the third in 1976, and the fourth in 2001. The first part of the book, which
details the program, has remained largely intact, with minor statistical updates and edits. The second part contains
personal stories that are updated with every edition to reflect current AA membership, resulting in earlier stories
being removed—these were published separately in 2003 in the book “Experience, Strength, and Hope.”[72]
Anonymity:
Originally, anonymity was practiced as a result of the experimental nature of the fellowship and to protect members
from the stigma of being seen as an alcoholic. The name "Alcoholics Anonymous" referred to the members, not to
the message. If members made their membership in AA public, especially at the level of public media, and then
went out and drank again, it would not only harm the reputation of AA but threaten the very survival of the
fellowship. Later, as a result of anonymity breaks in the public media by celebrity members of AA, Wilson
determined that the deeper purpose of anonymity was to prevent alcoholic egos from seeking fame and fortune at
AA expense.[73] Wilson also saw anonymity as a principle that would prevent members from indulging in ego
desires that might actually lead them to drink again—hence Tradition Twelve -- which made anonymity a core
spiritual requirement for AA.[74]
Into the 21st century:

As AA grew in size and popularity from over 100 members in 1939, other notable events in its history have included
the following:[75]
* 1944 In June, AA “Grapevine magazine” was published containing first-person stories of AA members. Its slogan "an AA
meeting in print" was adopted after receiving supportive letters from AA members in overseas military.
* 1945 AA adopted the “AA Grapevine” as its national journal.
* 1946 In April, AA Grapevine first published the “Twelve Traditions” (in the long/original form) as “Twelve Points to Assure
Our Future.” They were derived by Wilson from group letters to AA headquarters asking how to handle disputes over such issues
as finance, publicity, and outside affiliations, and were intended to be guidelines on group conduct and avoiding controversy.[76]
* 1949 AA Grapevine became the international journal of AA due to added readership in Canada and Europe.
* 1949 A group of recovering alcoholics and AA members founded “Hazelden Farm,” a Minneapolis refuge and treatment
center. Since then, 93 percent of alcohol rehabilitation clinics use AA concepts in their treatment,[77] and a reverse influence has
also occurred, with AA receiving 31 percent of its membership from treatment-center referrals.[78]
* 1950 “The Twelve Traditions” were unanimously adopted at AA's First International Convention.
* 1950 On November 16, Dr. Bob Smith died. There were about 100,000 AA members.[1]
* 1953 The Twelve Traditions were published in the book “Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions.”[79][80]
* 1953 “Narcotics Anonymous” received permission from AA to use the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions in its own
program.[81]
* 1955 “Second Edition of the Big Book” released with estimated 150,000 AA members.[82]
* 1957 Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age was published.[83]
* 1962 “The Twelve Concepts for World Service” were adopted by AA as a guideline for international issues.[84]
* 1962 The movie “Days of Wine and Roses” depicted an alcoholic in AA.[85]
* 1971 Bill Wilson died. His last words to AA members were, "God bless you and Alcoholics Anonymous forever."[1]
* 1976 “Third Edition of the Big Book” released with estimated 1,000,000 AA members.[82]
* 1980 “Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers” gave an account of AA development in and around Akron and Cleveland, Ohio.
* 1984 “Pass It On” detailed Wilson's life story.
* 1988 The movie “Clean and Sober” depicted such aspects of AA culture as sponsorship.
* 1989 The movie “My Name Is Bill W.” portrayed the AA story.
2001 “Fourth Edition of the Big Book” released with an estimated 2,000,000 or more members in 100,800 groups meeting in
approximately 150 countries around the world.[86]
References:
1. a b c AA Fact File, Birth of AA
2. Edwards, Griffith (April 2002). "Chapter 8: Alcoholics Anonymous". Alcohol: The World's Favorite Drug (1st
ed.). Thomas Dunne Books. pp. 103–117. ISBN 0312283873. OCLC 48176740.
3. Cheever, Susan (June 1999). "TIME 100: Bill Wilson". TIME 153 (23): 201.
http://www.time.com/time/time100/heroes/profile/wilson01.html. Retrieved March 31, 2007.
4. Clinebell Jr., Howard J. Understanding and Counseling the Alcoholic Through Religion and Psychology
Abingdon Press, 1956
5. The Emmanuel Movement and Richard Peabody, Journal of Studies on Alcohol, Vol.45, No.1, 1984
6. Hartigan, p. 98-99
7. Mercadante, Linda "Victims and Sinners" p. 50-51 p.50. Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996,
ISBN 978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
8. Cheever, p. 111
9. In 1955 Bill Wilson also known as Bill W., one of the two cofounders of Alcoholics Anonymous,
acknowledged the impact the Oxford Group had on Alcoholics Anonymous in that "early AA got its ideas of self-
examination, acknowledgment of character defects, restitution for harm done, and working with others straight from
the Oxford Group and directly from Rev. Sam Shoemaker, their former religious counsel in America, and from
nowhere else." – Pittman, Bill, AA the Way it Began, Glenn Abbey Books, 1988
10. Cheever, p. 145
11. a b c Mercdante, Linda A, "Victims and Sinners": p. 55 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date January
1, 1996 ISBN 9780664255084 ISBN 0664255086
12. Layman with a Notebook "What is Oxford" p.15-16 1933 by Oxford University Press, London
13. a b Pittman, Bill AA the Way it Began Glen Abbey Books, 1988
14. Pass It On, p 114
15. 1961 letter from Dr. Carl Jung to Bill Wilson concerning Rowland Hazard III - photographic image
16. Jung, C.G., Retrospective 1961 letter from Dr. C.G. Jung to Bill Wilson about Rowland Hazard III - text form,
with commentary by the Big Book Bunch.
17. Pass It On, p. 113-114
18. Finlay, Steven W. (March 2000). "Influence of Carl Jung and William James on the Origin of Alcoholics
Anonymous". Review of General Psychology 4 (1): 3–12. doi:10.1037/1089-2680.4.1.3. ISSN 1089-2680. OCLC
34948489. http://content.apa.org/journals/gpr/4/1/3. Retrieved October 20, 2006.
19. Pass It On, p 127.
20. a b Pass It On, p 117.
21. Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age p. 179
22. Walter HA, Soul Surgery p. 44 Oxford: The Oxford Group
24. Hartigan, p. 57
25. Alcoholics Anonymous (June 2001). "Chapter 1: Bill's Story" (PDF). Alcoholics Anonymous (4th ed.). New
York, New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services. pp. 1–16. ISBN 1893007162. OCLC 32014950.
http://www.aa.org/bigbookonline/en_BigBook_chapt1.pdf.
26. Hartigan, p. 58
27. Hartigan, p. 59
28. Pittman, p. 169
30. Pittman, p.170
32. a b Hartigan, p. 70-71
34. Cheever, Susan. My Name is Bill
35. Pass It On, p. 131-149.
36. Pass It On, p. 151
37. a b Pass It On, p. 154
38. Hartigan, p.90-91
39. Cheever, p.194
40. Cheever, p. 193-195
41. Hartigan, p.89-91
42. Pass it On p. 164
43. Pass it On p. 164-167
44. Pass it On p. 167-170
45. Pass it On p. 171-174
46. a b Hartigan, p. 94-98
47. Hartigan, p. 91
48. Pass It On, p. 70-72 152-189
49. Alcoholics Anonymous, First Edition "We Agnostics p.45
50. Pass It On, p.187
52. Pass It On p. 233
53. Pass It On, p. 152-189
55. Pass It On, p. 161, 190-196
56. Hartigan, p.126
57. http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl
58. Pass It On p. 196, 235
59. Lois Remembers. p.112 New York: Al-Anon, 1979
60. Lois Remembers p. 204
61. Pass It On p. 230-236
62. Hartigan, p. 129-132
63. Pittman, p. 160
64. a b Pass It On, p. 196-197
67. Hartigan, p. 114
68. Hartigan, p. 92
69. Pass It On p.202-209
70. Fulton Oursler. "Alcoholics and God." Liberty. September 30, 1939.
71. Jack Alexander. "Alcoholics Anonymous." Saturday Evening Post. March 1, 1941.
72. Experience, Strength and Hope: Stories from the First Three Editions of Alcoholics Anonymous, New York:
Alcoholics Anonymous, 2003, ISBN 1893007308 ISBN 9781893007307.
73. Pass It On p. 306-307
74. Pass It On p. 307-308.
75. Big Book First Edition
76. Pass It On, p. 305-306
77. N. Roberson, Getting Better: Inside Alcoholics Anonymous (London: Macmillan, 1988), p. 220
78. http://www.alcoholics-anonymous.org/en_pdfs/p-48_04survey.pdf AA 2004 Membership Survey
79. 12x12
80. Alcoholics Anonymous p. 561
81. Narcotics Anonymous
82. a b Big Book, Third Edition, 1976
83. Pass It On, p. 354
84. The AA Service Manual/Twelve Concepts for World Service (BM-31).
85. Days of Wine and Roses at the Internet Movie Database.
86. Big Book, Fourth Edition, 2001
87.
Sources
* Alcoholics Anonymous (1957). Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age: A Brief History of A. A.. New York:
Alcoholics Anonymous World Services. ISBN 0-9168-5602-X.
* Alcoholics Anonymous (1984). 'Pass It On': The Story of Bill Wilson and How the A. A. Message Reached the
World. New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services. ISBN 0-9168-5612-7.
* Cheever, Susan (2004). My Name Is Bill: Bill Wilson--His Life and the Creation of Alcoholics Anonymous.
New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-0154-x.
* Hartigan, Francis (2000). Bill W.: A Biography of Alcoholics Anonymous Cofounder Bill Wilson (1 ed.). New
York: St. Martins Press. ISBN 0-3122-0056-0.
* Pittman, Bill (1988). AA The Way It Began. Glen Abbey Books. ISBN 0-9341-2508-2.
Further reading:
* Ernest Kurtz. AA: The Story (A Revised Edition of Not-God). Random House Value Publishing, 1991. ISBN
0517064057, ISBN 978-0517064054.
Bill W.
William Griffith Wilson (November 26, 1895 – January 24, 1971), also known as Bill Wilson or Bill W., was the
co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), a fellowship of 100,800 mutual aid groups world-wide [1] of alcoholics
helping other alcoholics achieve and maintain sobriety. In compliance with AA Twelfth Tradition of anonymity,
Wilson is commonly known as "Bill W." or just "Bill." [2]
Wilson achieved sobriety on December 11, 1934, and maintained it throughout his remaining 36 years. Despite the
success and celebrity afforded him by the accomplishments and growth of AA under his leadership, he continued to
suffer from episodes of depression, the most serious of these between 1944 and 1955. In 1955 Wilson turned over
control of AA to a board of trustees. In the years before his death he changed the makeup of the board, which was
initially composed of a non-alcoholic majority, to trustees who were both recovered alcoholics and non-alcoholics,
with the majority being recovered alcoholics. In keeping with his interest in spirituality, he experimented with other
possible cures for alcoholism. These experiments included LSD,[3] niacin (vitamin B3) and parapsychology as a
means of inducing “spiritual change.”[4] Wilson died of emphysema complicated by pneumonia in 1971. His wife,
Lois Wilson, was the founder of Al-Anon, a group dedicated to helping the friends and relatives of alcoholics. In
1999 Time Magazine declared Wilson to be in the top 20 of the “Time 100: Heroes and Icons” who exemplified
"courage, selflessness, exuberance, superhuman ability and amazing grace" in the 20th century.[5]
Early life:
Wilson was born on November 26, 1895, in East Dorset, Vermont, at his parents' home, now known as the “Bill
Wilson House.” His paternal grandfather, William Wilson, had been an alcoholic and had a conversion experience
on Mount Aeolus and stayed dry for the remaining years of his life.[6] His father left on a "business trip" that turned
out to be a permanent absence, and his mother announced that she would be leaving the family to study osteopathic
medicine. Abandoned by their parents, Bill and his sister were left in the care of their maternal grandparents Fayette
Griffith and Ella Griffith. Bill and his sister moved in with their grandparents in the small Griffith House, today the
Griffith Library in East Dorset, Vermont. Wilson showed some talent and determination in his teen years, once
spending months designing and carving a working boomerang. At school, after initial difficulties, he found success
as the captain of his school's football team and as the principal violinist of the school orchestra.[7] But he
experienced a serious depression at the age of seventeen when his first love, Bertha Bamford, died of complications
during surgery.[8]
Marriage, work, and addiction:

Wilson met his future wife, Lois Burnham, who was four years older than he, during the summer of 1913 while
sailing on Vermont's Emerald Lake; two years later the couple became engaged. He entered Norwich University, but
depression and panic attacks forced him to leave during his second semester. The next year he returned, but was
soon suspended with a group of students involved in a hazing incident.[9] Because no one would take responsibility,
and no one would identify the perpetrators, the entire class was punished.[10]
The June 1916 incursion into the US by Pancho Villa resulted in Wilson's class being mobilized as part of the
Vermont Guard and he was reinstated to serve. The following year he was commissioned as an artillery officer.
During military training in Massachusetts, the young officers were often invited to dinner by the locals, and Wilson
had his first drink, a glass of beer, to little effect.[11] A few weeks later at another dinner party, Wilson drank some
“Bronx cocktails” -- essentially a Martini with orange juice added -- and felt at ease with the guests and liberated
from his awkward shyness; "I had found the elixir of life," he wrote.[12] "Even that first evening I got thoroughly
drunk, and within the next time or two I passed out completely. But as everyone drank hard, not too much was made
of that."[4]
Wilson married Lois on January 24, 1918, just before he left to serve in World War I as a 2nd Lieutenant in the
Coast Artillery.[13] After his military service, Wilson returned to live with his wife in New York. He failed to
graduate from law school because he was too drunk to pick up his diploma.[14] Wilson became a stock speculator
and had success traveling the country with his wife, evaluating companies for potential investors. During these trips
Lois had a hidden agenda -- she hoped the travel would keep Wilson from drinking.[15] However, Wilson's constant
drinking made business impossible and ruined his reputation.
In 1933 Wilson was committed to the “Charles B. Towns Hospital for Drug and Alcohol Addictions” in New York
City four times under the care of Dr. William D. Silkworth. Silkworth's theory was that alcoholism was a matter of
both physical and mental control, i.e., (1) a craving, (2) the manifestation of a physical allergy (the physical inability
to stop drinking once started), and (3) an obsession of the mind (to take the first drink).[16] Wilson gained hope
from Silkworth's assertion that alcoholism was a medical condition rather than a moral failing, but even that
knowledge could not help him. He was eventually told that he would either die from his alcoholism or have to be
locked up permanently due to “Wernicke’s encephalopathy” (commonly referred to as "wet brain") a syndrome
characterized by ataxia, ophthalmoplegia, confusion, and impairment of short-term memory resulting from
inadequate intake or absorption of thiamin (vitamin B1).
Political beliefs:
Wilson was a lifelong political conservative, having opposed Franklin D. Roosevelt as well as “The New Deal.”
Though he benefited from Roosevelt's mortgage moratorium, he wrote to Roosevelt denouncing The New Deal.
Wilson and his wife were living in her father's house at the time and the moratorium prevented mortgage
foreclosures; they satisfied the mortgage company with a small monthly fee.[17] However Wilson kept a neutral
position on politics in his leadership of A.A., writing in A.A. literature that politics should be left outside of A.A.
groups in order to make them available regardless of political or religious creed.
A spiritual program for recovery:

In November 1934, Wilson was visited by old drinking companion Ebby Thacher. Wilson was astounded to find that
Thacher had been sober for several weeks under the guidance of the evangelical Christian Oxford Group.[18]
Wilson took some interest in the Group, but shortly after Thacher's visit, he was again admitted to Towns Hospital
to recover from a bout of drinking. This was his fourth and last stay at Towns hospital under Doctor Silkworth's
care. It was while undergoing treatment with The Belladonna Cure that Wilson experienced his "Hot Flash" spiritual
conversion (belladonna’s effects include dilated pupils with light sensitivity, facial flushing, hallucinations, and
delirium); he subsequently quit drinking.[19] According to Wilson, while lying in bed depressed and despairing, he
cried out, "I'll do anything! Anything at all! If there be a God, let Him show Himself!"[20] He then had the sensation
of a bright light, a feeling of ecstasy, and a new serenity. He never drank again for the remainder of his life. Wilson
described his experience to Dr. Silkworth, who told him, "Something has happened to you I don't understand. But
you had better hang on to it.”
Wilson joined the Oxford Group and tried to help other alcoholics, but only succeeded in keeping sober himself.
During a failed business trip to Akron, Ohio, Wilson was tempted to drink again and decided that to remain sober he
needed to help another alcoholic. He called phone numbers on a church directory and eventually secured an
introduction to Dr. Bob Smith, an alcoholic Oxford Group member. Wilson explained Doctor Silkworth's theory that
alcoholics suffer from a physical allergy and a mental obsession. Wilson shared that the only way he was able to
stay sober was through having a spiritual experience. Dr. Bob was familiar with the tenets of the Oxford Group and
upon hearing Wilson's experience, "began to pursue the spiritual remedy for his malady with a willingness that he
had never before been able to muster. After a brief relapse, he sobered, never to drink again up to the moment of his
death in 1950.”[21] Wilson and Dr. Bob began working with other alcoholics. After that summer in Akron, Wilson
returned to New York where he began having success helping alcoholics in what they called "a nameless squad of
drunks" in an Oxford Group there.
In 1938, after about 100 alcoholics in Akron and New York had become sober, the fellowship decided to promote its
program of recovery through the publication of a book, for which Wilson was chosen as primary author. The book
was given the title, “Alcoholics Anonymous” and included the list of suggested activities for spiritual growth known
as the Twelve Steps. The movement itself took on the name of the book. Later Wilson also wrote the “Twelve
Traditions,” a set of spiritual guidelines to ensure the survival of individual AA groups. The AA general service
conference of 1955 was a landmark event for Wilson in which he turned over the leadership of the maturing
organization to an elected board.
The final years:

During the last years of his life, Wilson rarely attended AA meetings on the grounds that he would always be asked
to speak as the co-founder rather than as an alcoholic.[22] A heavy smoker, Wilson eventually suffered from
emphysema and later pneumonia. He continued to smoke while dependent on an oxygen tank in the late 1960’s.[23]
He drank no alcohol for the final 37 years of his life, however, it was in his last days of his life he made demands for
whiskey and became belligerent when refused. [24] During this period Wilson was visited by colleagues and friends
who wanted to say goodbye. Wilson died of emphysema and pneumonia on January 24, 1971, en route to treatment
in Miami, Florida. He is buried in East Dorset, Vermont.[25]
Temptation and reports of infidelity:

Wilson had alluded to unfulfilled temptation in an account in the Alcoholics Anonymous "Big Book." He stated,
"There had been no real infidelity, for loyalty to my wife, helped at times by extreme drunkenness, kept me out of
those scrapes."[26] Biographers Francis Hartigan, Matthew Raphael, and Susan Cheever cite claims that Wilson had
sexual contacts outside of his marriage.
Francis Hartigan, AA biographer and personal secretary to Lois Wilson, in his book states that in the mid 1950’s Bill
began an affair with Helen Wynn, a woman 22 years his junior. Bill at one point discussed divorcing Lois to marry
Helen. Bill eventually overcame the AA trustees' objections, and renegotiated his royalty agreements with them in
1963, which allowed him to include Helen Wynn in his estate. He left 10 percent of his book royalties to her and the
other 90 percent to his wife Lois. In 1968, with Bill's illness making it harder for them to spend time together, Helen
bought a house in Ireland.[27]
Personal letters between Wilson and his wife Lois spanning a period of more than 60 years can be found in the
archives at “Stepping Stones,” their former home in Katonah, New York, and in AA's General Service Office
archives in New York.[28]
Alternative cures and spiritualism:

In the 1950’s Wilson experimented with LSD in medically supervised experiments with Betty Eisner, Gerald Heard,
and Aldous Huxley. With Wilson's invitation, his wife Lois, his spiritual adviser Father Ed Dowling, and Nell Wing
also participated in experimentation of this drug. Later Wilson wrote to Carl Jung, praising the results and
recommending it as validation of Jung's spiritual experience. The letter was not in fact sent as Jung had died.[29]
At a parapsychology meeting in the 1960’s, Wilson met Abram Hoffer and learned about the potential mood-
stabilizing effects of niacin.[30] Wilson was impressed with experiments indicating that alcoholics who were given
niacin had a better sobriety rate, and he began to see niacin "as completing the third leg in the stool, the physical to
complement the spiritual and emotional." Wilson also believed that niacin had given him relief from depression, and
he promoted the vitamin within the AA community and with the National Institute of Mental Health as a treatment
for schizophrenia. However, Wilson created a major furor in AA because he used the AA office and letterhead in his
promotion.[31]
For Wilson, spiritualism was a life-long interest. One of his letters to adviser Father Dowling suggests that while
Wilson was working on his book “Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions,” he felt that spirits were helping him, in
particular a 15th century monk named “Boniface.”[32] Despite his conviction that he had evidence for the reality of
the spirit world, Wilson chose not to share this with AA. However his practices still created controversy within the
AA membership. Wilson and his wife continued with their unusual practices in spite of the misgivings of many AA
members. In their house they had a "spook room" where they would invite guests to participate in seances using a
Ouija board.[33][34]
Legacy:
Alcoholics Anonymous, the fellowship that Wilson co-founded with Dr. Bob Smith, continues world-wide with over
a hundred thousand registered local groups and millions of active members.[35]
Wilson bought a house that he and Lois called “Stepping Stones” (vide supra) on an 8-acre (3.2 hectare) estate in
Bedford Hills, New York, in 1941, and he lived there with Lois until he died in 1971. After Lois died in 1988, the
house was opened for tours and is now on the National Register of Historic Places.[36]
Wilson has often been described as having loved being the center of attention, but after the AA principle of
anonymity had become established, he refused an honorary degree from Yale University and refused to allow his
picture, even from the back, on the cover of Time. Wilson's persistence, his ability to take and use good ideas, and
his entrepreneurial flair[37] are revealed in his pioneering escape from an alcoholic “death sentence,” his central role
in the development of a program of spiritual growth, and his leadership in creating and building AA, "an
independent, entrepreneurial, maddeningly democratic, non-profit organization."[38]
Wilson is perhaps best known as a synthesis of ideas,[39] the man who pulled together various threads of
psychology, theology, and democracy into a workable and life-saving system. Aldous Huxley called him "the
greatest social architect of our century,"[40] and Time magazine named Wilson to their “Time 100 List of The Most
Important People of the 20th Century.”[41] Wilson's self-description was a man who "because of his bitter
experience, discovered, slowly and through a conversion experience, a system of behavior and a series of actions
that work for alcoholics who want to stop drinking."
Biographer Susan Cheever wrote in “My Name Is Bill,” that "Bill Wilson never held himself up as a model: he only
hoped to help other people by sharing his own experience, strength and hope. He insisted again and again that he
was just an ordinary man.”
Notes
1. "Alcoholics Anonymous" p XIX
2. The Traditions also recommend that AA members maintain their anonymity at the level of media. After Wilson's death in
1971 and publication of his full name in obituaries, the AA General Service Conference advised that "AA members generally
think it unwise to break the anonymity of a member even after his death, but in each situation the final decision must rest with the
family.” This was the case with both Wilson and fellow AA co-founder "Dr. Bob" Smith before him. See
http://aa.org/pdf/products/p-47_understandinganonymity1.pdf for further information.
3. http://www.texasdistrict5.com/lsd.htm
4. a b Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. (1984), "Pass it on": the story of Bill Wilson and how the A.A. message
reached the world, ISBN 0916856127.
5. Time Magazine Time 100: The most important people of the century, Retrieved December 31, 2007.
6. Cheever, p 25.
7. "Pass It ON" pp. 32-34
8. B., Mel (2000). My Search For Bill W.. pp. 5–10. ISBN 1-56838-374-6.
9. Thomsen, Robert (1975). Bill W.. pp. 75, 96. ISBN 0-06-014267-7.
10. Raphael, p. 40.
11. Cheever, p 73.
12. "Bill W.: from the rubble of a wasted life, he overcame alcoholism and founded the 12-step program that has helped
millions of others do the same." (Time's "The Most Important People of the 20th Century.”) Susan Cheever. Time 153.23 (June
14, 1999): p201+.
13. Pass It On p 54.
14. Cheever, 2004, p 91.
15. Pass it on p 59.
16. "Alcoholics Anonymous" p XXIII-XXVI
17. Hartigan, Francis "Bill W" p. 5 & 49
19. Pittman, Bill "AA the Way it Began p. 163-165
21. Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous p xvi
22. Raphael 2000, p. 167.
23. Cheever, 2004, pp 245 - 247.
24. Cheever, 2004, pp 245 - 247.
25. "William G. "Bill" Wilson.” Find a Grave. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=2535. Retrieved
October 20, 2010.
26. Alcoholics Anonymous World Services 1936, Alcoholics Anonymous 3rd Edition, page 3
27. Franics Haritigan Bill W. Chapter 25 p.190-197 and pages 170-171 St. Martins Press, year 2000, 1st edition, ISBN 0-312-
20056-0
28. Francis Hartigan, Bill W., Chapter 25, p. 190-197 and p. 170-171, St. Martins Press, 2000, 1st edition, ISBN 0-312-20056-0
29. Francis Hartigan Bill Wilson p. 177-179.
30. http://www.doctoryourself.com/Hoffer2009int.pdf
31. Francis Hartigan Bill W P.205-208
32. Robert Fitzgerald. The Soul of Sponsorship: The Friendship of Fr. Ed Dowling, S.J. and Bill Wilson in Letters. Hazelden
Publishing & Educational Services: 1995. ISBN 978-1568380841. p 59.
33. Harigan, Francis, Bill W.
34. Ernest Kurtz. Not-God: A History of Alcoholics Anonymous. Hazelden Educational Foundation, Center City, MN, 1979. p
136.
35. Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th ed., p. xxiii
36. Alcoholics Anonymous Founder’s House Is a Self-Help Landmark. New York Times. July 6, 2007
37. Griffith Edwards. Alcohol: The World's Favorite Drug. 1st U.S. ed. New York : Thomas Dunne Books, 2002. ISBN 0-312-
28387-3. p 109.
38. Are we making the most of Alcoholics Anonymous? Peter Armstrong. The Journal of Addiction and Mental Health 5.1,
Jan-Feb 2002. p16.
39. Cheever, 2004, p 122.
40. Cheever, 1999.
41. Time 100 Most Important
Sources and further reading
* The A.A. Service Manual combined with Twelve Concepts for World Service (2004-2005 ed.). New York:
Alcoholics Anonymous. 2004. http://www.aa.org/default/en_services_aa.cfm?pageid=46.
* Susan Cheever. My Name is Bill, Bill Wilson: His Life and the Creation of Alcoholics Anonymous. New York:
Simon & Schuster/ Washington Square Press. ISBN 978-0-7434-0591-1 (paperback).
* Alcoholics Anonymous. The Story of How Many Thousands of Men and Women Have Recovered from
Alcoholism (4th ed. new and rev. 2001 ed.). New York: Alcoholics Anonymous. ISBN 1-893007-16-2, Dewey
362.29 A347 2001. http://www.aa.org/bigbookonline/. ('Big Book')
* Alcoholics Anonymous Comes Of Age. New York: Alcoholics Anonymous. ISBN 0-916856-02-X, LC
HV5278.A78A4, Dewey: 178.1 A1c.
* As Bill Sees It. New York: Alcoholics Anonymous. 1967. ISBN 0-916856-03-8, Dewey 616.861 ASB.
* Bill W. (2000). My First 40 Years. An Autobiography by the Cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous. Center
City, Minnesota: Hazelden, 55012-0176. ISBN 1-56838-373-8, Dewey B W11w 2000.
* Dr. Bob and the Good Old-timers. New York: Alcoholics Anonymous. 1980. ISBN 0-916856-07-0, LCCN 80-
65962, LC HV5278.D62 1980.
* Hartigan, Francis (2000). Bill W. A Biography of Alcoholics Anonymous Cofounder Bill Wilson. New York:
Thomas Dunne Books. ISBN 0-312-20056-0, Dewey B W11h 2000.
* Kurtz, Ernest (1979). Not-God: A History of Alcoholics Anonymous. Center City, Minnesota: Hazelden. ISBN
0-89486-065-8 or ISBN 0-89486-065-8 (pbk.), LC HV5278, LCCN 79-88264, Dewey 362.2/9286 or 362.29286
K87 1979.
* Pass It On: The story of Bill Wilson and how the A.A. message reached the world. New York: Alcoholics
Anonymous. 1984. ISBN 0-916856-12-7, LC HV5032 .W19P37x 1984, LCCN 84-072766, Dewey 362.29/286/O92.
* Raphael, Matthew J. (2000). Bill W. and Mr. Wilson: The Legend and Life of A.A.'s Cofounder. Amherst,
Massachusetts: University of Massachusetts Press. ISBN 1-55849-245-3.
* Thomsen, Robert (1975). Bill W.. New York: Harper & Rowe. ISBN 0-06-014267-7, Dewey 362.29 W112t.
* Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. New York: Alcoholics Anonymous. 1953. ISBN 0-916856-01-1.
* Faberman, J., & Geller, J. L. (January 2005). "My Name is Bill: Bill Wilson--His life and the Creation of
Alcoholics Anonymous.” Psychiatric Services 56 (1): 117. doi:10.1176/appi.ps.56.1.117.
Galanter, M. (May 2005). "Review of My Name Is Bill: Bill Wilson--His Life and the Creation of Alcoholics
Anonymous.” American Journal of Psychiatry 162 (5): 1037–1038. doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.162.5.1037.
Bob Smith (“Doctor Bob”)
Robert Holbrook Smith (August 8, 1879 – November 16, 1950) was an American physician and surgeon who co-
founded Alcoholics Anonymous with Bill Wilson, more commonly known as Bill W. He was also known as Dr.
Bob.[1] He was born in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, where he was raised, to Susan A. Holbrook and Walter Perrin
Smith.[2] After graduation from Dartmouth College in 1902, he completed medical school at Rush Medical College.
Smith was married to Anne Ripley Smith, who played a vital role in the development of the “12 steps of AA.” Smith
co-founded the recovery movement “Alcoholics Anonymous” with Bill Wilson, in 1935 in Akron, Ohio.
Smith was called the "Prince of Twelfth Steppers" by Wilson because he voluntarily helped more than 5000
alcoholics. In addition, it was in his home that the basic ideas of AA were developed. Many AA ideas developed
initially in an offshoot of the then-popular “Oxford Group,” which was a Christian movement. Smith said that AA's
basic ideas came from their study of the Bible; the “Steps,” in essence meant "love and service." Although Bill
Wilson had helped other alcoholics with little or no success, AA is said to have begun June 10, 1935. This was the
day "Dr. Bob" took his last bottle of beer, under the watch of Bill Wilson, to steady his hands for surgery. By
applying the spiritual solution of the 12 Steps and working with other alcoholics, Smith was able to stay sober from
June 10, 1935, until his death in 1950 from colon cancer.[citation needed]
Notes:
The Traditions of AA recommend that AA members maintain their anonymity at the level of media, in keeping
with the spirit of placing "principles before personalities." Members typically refer to themselves publicly, if at all,
by first name and last initial only. After the 1971 death of AA co-founder Bill W. and publication of his full name
in obituaries, the AA General Service Conference advised that "AA members generally think it unwise to break
the anonymity of a member even after his death, but in each situation the final decision must rest with the family."
(See http://aa.org/pdf/products/p-47_understandinganonymity1.pdf for further information.) This was the case
with "Dr. Bob," who died shortly after the formal adoption of the Twelve Traditions at AA's First International
Convention in 1950.
Ancestry of "Dr. Bob S."

Judge Walter Perrin Smith and Miss Susan Amanda Holbrook were married in Vermont on August 15, 1876; their
only son, Robert Holbrook Smith (Dr. Bob), was born at the family home on Summer Street, St. Johnsbury,
Vermont, on August 8, 1879.
Bob’s father, Judge Smith, was a member, Sunday school superintendent, Sunday school teacher, and later a deacon
at North Congregational Church. Bob’s mother, Susan H. Smith, was a member, Sunday school superintendent,
Sunday school teacher, president of the Congregational Women’s Club, singer in the church quartet, and involved in
domestic mission work at North Congregational Church. Judge Smith had been a president of the YMCA and
examiner at St. Johnsbury Academy. Mrs. Smith was a graduate of the St. Johnsbury Academy, a teacher there, an
Academy historian, and a member of the Alumni Executive Committee.
As a child, Bob Smith attended the Summer Street elementary school in St. Johnsbury from 1885 to 1894. Then, 15-
year-old Bob Smith entered St. Johnsbury Academy in 1894. Bob met Anne Robinson Ripley of Oak Park, Illinois,
at a St. Johnsbury Academy dance while Anne (a student at Wellesley) was spending a holiday with a college friend.
Robert H. Smith was noted to be a good student, debater, fraternity member, manager of the Glee Club, and
Commencement Orator at his graduation ceremony at St. Johnsbury Academy in 1898. He graduated with good
grades. Throughout his years as a youngster in St. Johnsbury, “Dr. Bob” received excellent, extensive, and
continuing Christian religious training from his parents.
All “scholars”—known today as “students”—at the St. Johnsbury Academy were required to attend Daily Chapel, of
which prayer and Scripture reading were a part. They were all required weekly to attend a church service and Bible
study. Bob specifically stated that, from childhood through high school, he went to church, Sunday school and
evening service, Monday night Christian Endeavor, and sometimes to the Wednesday-evening prayer meeting. His
activity in the Christian Endeavor Society involved confession of Christ, Bible study meetings, prayer meetings,
conversion meetings, discussions of religious literature, and the observing of Quiet Hour.
In 1898, Bob attended Dartmouth College, which was located about 60 miles south at Hanover, New Hampshire. He
graduated from Dartmouth in 1902.
Bob spent the next three years working at various jobs in Chicago, Montreal, and Boston. In fact, for his first two
years out of Dartmouth (1902-1904), he was employed by the Fairbanks Company, the St. Johnsbury scales
manufacturing company for which his father had once been an attorney. Today, the successor of that company is
known as Fairbanks Scales, Inc., which is headquartered in Kansas City, Missouri, but still maintains a factory in St.
Johnsbury. Smith entered the University of Michigan as a premed student in 1905. Thereafter, despite his drinking
problems, he received his credits and was enabled to transfer to Rush University as a junior, in the fall of 1907.
In 1910, after further training at Rush Memorial College in Chicago, he received his medical degree. In fact, his
scholarship and deportment had been so meritorious that he secured a highly coveted two-year internship at City
Hospital, Akron, Ohio. He completed his internship in 1912, opened an office in the Second National Bank
Building, and remained there until his retirement in 1948. After a period as a general practitioner, Dr. Bob decided
to become a surgeon. He received further medical training at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and at Jefferson
Medical School in Philadelphia. In 1929, he began a specialized practice as a proctologist and colo-rectal surgeon.
Dr. Bob Smith married Miss Anne Robinson Ripley on January 25, 1915, in a ceremony at the home of Anne’s
mother, Mrs. Joseph Pierce Ripley. Robert H. and Anne R. Smith purchased a home at 855 Ardmore in Akron,
Ohio—the place where Alcoholics Anonymous was founded on June 10, 1935, by Bob and Bill Wilson. Their only
son, Robert Ripley Smith, was born on June 5, 1918, and he was given the nickname “Smitty.” Many years later,
Smitty became a much sought after speaker at A.A., Al-Anon, and history meetings.
The other child of Dr. Bob and Anne (Suzanne Smith Windows) was born February 15, 1918. Her biological mother
had turned her children over to their maternal grandmother who, in turn, gave up the children to the Summit County,
Ohio, Children’s Home. In the summer of 1923, at age 5, Sue was adopted by Dr. Bob and Anne Smith. Sue spent
the next 17 years living with them and her step-brother Smitty in the Smith house on Ardmore Avenue.
Anne Ripley Smith died on June 1, 1949. Anne was called by A.A. Cofounder Bill Wilson “one of the founders of
A.A.” and also “the Mother of A.A.” Shortly after Anne’s death, and before he died, Dr. Bob became a
“communicant” at St. Paul’s Protestant Episcopal Church in Akron, Ohio. This was the church of which Dr. Walter
F. Tunks was rector when Bill Wilson contacted him in 1935, searching for a drunk to help. Dr. Tunks was Harvey
Firestone, Sr.’s pastor and was a substantial participant in the events that brought Oxford Group Founder, Dr. Frank
N. D. Buchman, to Akron in the famous events of January 1933 that soon led to the founding of A.A. in 1935.
Tunks performed several liturgical services involving Bob’s family.
Dr. Bob died of cancer at City Hospital, Akron, on November 16, 1950. He was not only the Cofounder of
Alcoholics Anonymous, but was rightly called by Bill Wilson “The Prince of All Twelfth Steppers”—certainly in
recognition of the fact that he helped over 5,000 drunks without any thought of pay.
Robert Holbrook Smith, M.D., left a legacy of many things not material; he believed that the “Good Book “
contained all the answers to his problems and those of the A.A. pioneers. He read the Bible from cover to cover at
least three times and freely quoted from it when asked a question about the A.A. program. He read voluminous
amounts of religious literature and widely circulated that literature among the A.A. pioneers and their families. He
insisted that new members profess a belief in God. He also insisted that they, as he and Bill Wilson themselves had
done, signify their decision to commit their lives to Christ. “Quiet Time,” where there was reading of the Bible,
prayer to God, and seeking of God’s guidance, were “musts” in the early Christian Fellowship. Dr. Bob declared
that A.A.’s basic ideas came from their study of the Good Book. He professed that the Book of James, Jesus’
Sermon on the Mount, and “1 Corinthians 13” were “absolutely essential” to the program for the cure of alcoholism.
Of the Twelve Steps, while declaring that he had nothing to do with writing them, he said that, when simmered to
the essence, they involved the principles of “love and service.” And he assured all, at the close of his personal story,
“Your Heavenly Father will never let you down!”
Ebby Thacher
Edwin Throckmorton Thacher (29 April 1896–21 March 1966) (commonly known as Ebby Thacher or Ebby T.),
was an old drinking friend of Alcoholics Anonymous co-founder Bill Wilson. He is credited with introducing
Wilson to the initial principles that AA would soon develop, such as "one alcoholic talking to another," and the
“Jungian thesis” which was passed along to Rowland Hazard and, in turn, to Thacher that alcoholism could be cured
by a "genuine conversion.” [1]
Thacher was a school friend of Wilson, and battled his whole life with alcoholism, frequently landing in mental
hospitals or jail. After one bender, three members of The Oxford Group, Rowland Hazard, F. Shepard Cornell, and
Cebra Graves, convinced the court to parole Thacher into their custody. Hazard taught Thacher the “Oxford Group
Principles” and the idea that a conversion was needed between patients. Hazard lodged him in the Calvary Rescue
Mission, operated by the Calvary Episcopal Church in New York.
Beginnings of AA:
In November 1934, Thacher had arranged a visit to Wilson's apartment. Expecting to spend a day drinking and re-
living old times, Wilson was instead shocked by Thacher's refusal to drink. "I've got religion," he reportedly said to
Wilson's surprise. Thacher told Wilson of his conversion at the Rescue Mission and acquainted Wilson with the
teachings of Rowland Hazard about the “Oxford Group” life-changing program, as well as the prescription of Carl
Jung for a conversion.
Wilson at first declined Thacher's invitation to sobriety, and continued to drink in a more restrained way for a short
while. After talking with Dr. William D. Silkworth, however, he went to Calvary Rescue Mission and underwent a
religious conversion. He was then admitted to the “Charles B. Towns Hospital for Drug and Alcohol Addictions” in
New York City on December 11, 1934. Thacher visited him there on December 14 and essentially helped Wilson
take what would become Steps Four, Five, Six, Seven, and Eight.
Later life:
Wilson stayed sober and eventually formed Alcoholics Anonymous with Dr. Bob Smith while Thacher soon
returned to drinking. Wilson always called Thacher his "sponsor," and even though he had returned to drinking,
Wilson looked after his friend's welfare for the rest of his life. Thacher struggled on and off with sobriety over the
years, and ultimately died sober in Ballston Spa, New York from emphysema in 1966. Thacher was portrayed by
Gary Sinise in the TV movie, “My Name is Bill W.” (1989), which dramatized the founding of AA.
Footnotes
1. Dick B., The Conversion of Bill W., Kihei, HI: Paradise Research Publications, Inc., 2006.
Oxford Group
The Oxford Group was a Christian movement that had a following in Europe, China, Africa, Australia, Scandinavia
and America in the 1920’s and 30’s. It was initiated by an American Lutheran pastor, Dr. Frank Buchman, who was
of Swiss descent. In 1908 he claimed a conversion experience in a chapel in Keswick, England and later he initiated
a movement called A First Century Christian Fellowship in 1921, and by 1931, this had grown into a movement
which attracted thousands of adherents, many well-to-do, which became known as the Oxford Group.[1]
The group was unlike other forms of evangelism in that it targeted and directed its efforts to the "up and outers" --
the elites and wealthy of society. It made use of publicity regarding its prominent converts, and was caricatured as a
"Salvation Army for snobs." Buchman's message did not challenge the status quo and thus aided the Group's
popularity among the “well-to-do.”[2] Buchman made the cover of Time Magazine as "Cultist Frank Buchman: God
is a Millionaire" in 1936.[3] For a U.S. headquarters, he built a multimillion-dollar establishment on Michigan's
Mackinac Island, with room for 1,000 visitors. From Caux to London's Berkeley Square to New York's Westchester
County layouts, Buchman and his followers had the best. In response to criticism, Buchman had an answer, "Isn't
God a millionaire?" he would ask.[4]
The Oxford Group achieved popularity for a time, but it was a minority voice in America . The Oxford Group
movement was in reaction to the mainstream Christian churches, which were concerned with social systematic
problems; their gospels emphasized liberal and social issues. The Oxford Group's focus was on personal concerns
and placed the entire problem of human existence on personal sinfulness, asserting that individual sin was the key
problem and the entire solution was in the individual's conviction, confession, and surrender to God. The Group
revived an older 19th century approach in which the focus was on sin and conversion; it practiced a form of ethical
and religious perfectionism that was reduced to a call for a renewed morality.[5]
Buchman, who had little intellectual interest or even a real interest in theology, believed all change happens from the
individual outward, and stressed simplicity. He summed up the Group's philosophy in a few quotes:
“all people are sinners,”
“all sinners can be changed,”
“confession is a prerequisite to change,”
“the change can access god directly,”
“miracles are again possible,” and
“the change must change others.”[6]
By the 1930’s the Group had fallen into public disfavor; the public associated it with revivalist Protestantism, which
many mainstream Protestants and most Roman Catholics rejected. It began to be ridiculed in popular plays and
books.[7] In 1938, a time of military re-armament, Buchman proclaimed a need for "moral and spiritual re-
armament" and that phrase—shortened to Moral Re-Armament (MRA)—became the movement's name.
The Oxfords Group's influence can be found in Alcoholics Anonymous. Ebby Thacher, Rowland Hazard III, Bill
Wilson and Bob Smith, with Bill & Bob the two co-founders of Alcoholics Anonymous, were also members of the
Oxford Group up until 1940. Though early AA sought to distance itself from the Oxford Groups, Wilson later
acknowledged, "The early AA got its ideas of self-examination, acknowledgment of character defects, restitution for
harm done and working with others straight from the Oxford Group and directly from Sam Shoemaker, their former
leader in America, and from nowhere else."[8]
God control
In various speeches given by Frank Buchman, the Group's purpose was outlined:
* The secret is God control. The only sane people in an insane world are those controlled by
God. God-controlled personalities make God-controlled nationalities. This is the aim of the
Oxford Group. The true patriot gives his life to bring his nation under God's control. Those people
who oppose that control are public enemies.... World peace will only come through nations which
have achieved God-control. And everybody can listen to God. You can. I can. Everybody can have
a part.[9]
* There are those who feel that internationalism is not enough. Nationalism can unite a nation.
“Supernationalism” can unite a world. God-controlled supernationalism seems to be the only sure
foundation for world peace![10]
* I challenge Denmark to be a miracle among the nations: her national policy dictated by God,
her national defense the respect and gratitude of her neighbors, and her national armament an army
of life-changers. Denmark can demonstrate to the nations that spiritual power is the first force in
the world. The true patriot gives his life to bring about his country's resurrection.[11]
* The international problems are, at bottom, personal problems of selfishness and fear. Lives
must be changed if problems are to be solved. Peace in the world can only spring from peace in
the hearts of men. A dynamic experience of God’s free spirit is the answer to regional antagonism,
economic depression, racial conflict and international strife.[9]
The name:
The name "Oxford Group" originated in South Africa in 1929, as a result of a railway porter writing the name on the
windows of those compartments reserved by a traveling team of Frank Buchman followers. They were from Oxford,
England and in South Africa to promote the movement. The South African press picked up on the name and it
stuck.[12]
Even though in 1938, Buchman chose to rename the Group and call it “Moral Re-Armament,” in June 1939, he
applied to the Board of Trade in London to incorporate the name Oxford Group. The Oxford Group was considered
legally non-existent in an earlier court ruling, and Buchman could not collect a £500 inheritance left to the group by
a member. The use of the name Oxford by Buchman brought opposition from Oxford University. The application
was eventually approved, although the proposal had been debated both in Oxford and in the House of Commons, as
opponents claimed Buchman was trying to capitalize on the name of Oxford; 232 Members of Parliament signed a
petition supporting the incorporation, while 50 signed a motion opposing it. In June 1939 the Board of Trade
decided in the Group’s favor.[13][14][15]
International Expansion:
The Oxford Group conducted campaigns in many European countries. In 1934 a team of 30 visited Norway at the
invitation of Carl Hambro, President of the Norwegian Parliament. Nearly fourteen thousand people attended the
three meetings in Oslo, Norway. At the end of that year the Oslo daily, Tidens Tegn, commented in its Christmas
number, "A handful of foreigners who neither knew our language, nor understood our ways and customs, came to
the country. A few days later the whole country was talking about God, and two months after the thirty foreigners
arrived, the mental outlook of the whole country has definitely changed.”[16] On 22 April 1945, Bishop Fjellbu,
Bishop of Trondheim, preached in the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields, London. "I wish to state publicly," he said,
"that the foundations of the united resistance of Norwegian Churchmen to Nazism were laid by the Oxford Group's
work.”[17]
In 1935 a team of 250 people were welcomed to Switzerland by the President, Rudolf Minger. A vast number of
meetings took place. On one night in Geneva, Calvin's cathedral and one of the city's largest halls both overflowed.
"For many, these meetings were a turning point in their lives", according to professor Theophil Spoerri of the
University of Zurich. "It was almost as if something new was penetrating between the chink of the shutters. A
businessman, alone in his office, would feel a faint sense of unease if he was planning to cheat his fellow citizens.
The public conscience became more sensitive. The Director of Finance in one canton reported that after the national
day of thanksgiving and repentance, 6,000 tax payments were recorded, something which had never occurred
before.”[18]
While in Geneva, Prime Minister Edvard Beneš of Czechoslovakia invited Buchman and his colleagues to address a
luncheon at the League of Nations, attended by 32 of the League's Ministers Plenipotentiary. They listened to
Hambro's account of the Oxford Group's impact in Norway. "No man who has been in touch with the Group will go
back to his international work in the same spirit as before," he told them, "It has been made impossible for him to be
ruled by hate or prejudice.”[18]
Similar stories can be told of campaigns in Denmark, where Bishop Fuglsang-Damgaard, Bishop of Copenhagen,
said that the Oxford Group "has opened my eyes to that gift of God which is called Christian fellowship, and which I
have experienced in this Group to which I now belong.”[19] When the Nazis invaded Denmark, Bishop Fuglsang-
Damgaard was sent to a concentration camp. Before imprisonment he smuggled a message to Buchman saying that
through the Oxford Group he had found a spirit which the Nazis could not break and that he went without fear.[20]
In 1937 Buchman visited the Netherlands. 100,000 people attended gatherings in Utrecht over Whitsun that year.
"The greatest surprise was the appearance of Dr J Patijn, our Ambassador in Brussels", reported the Socialist paper
“Het Volk.” "Only those who know him as Burgomaster of The Hague, a sound but unapproachable man and averse
to any public show, will be able to appreciate fully what it must have cost him to speak about his inmost self before
many thousands. 'It is not for everyone,' he said, 'to speak in public about his faith, and it is not easy for me to do so.
Every man, however, must have the courage of his convictions... Through the Oxford Group I have learnt to see my
fellow men, the world and my whole life in a new perspective'.”
Controversy with the Church of England and the Vatican:

The group's lack of interest in theology made it easy for persons of different beliefs to work together. The group did
not oppose specific doctrines of the Church; the group's anti-intellectual stance allowed "Groupers" to simply
consider theology a waste of time for the changed person.[21]
By the 1950’s the Group was banned by the Catholic Church. Ildefonso Schuster, Cardinal Archbishop of Milan,
stated that the Moral Re-Armament Movement endangered both Catholics and non-Catholics. He called the
movement dangerous for non-Catholics because it presents a "form of religion cut in half and suggestive, morality
without dogma, without the principle of authority, without a supremely revealed faith —in a word, an arbitrary
religion, and therefore, one full of errors." The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano stated that secular and
regular clergy were forbidden to attend any meeting of Moral Re-Armament and that lay Catholics were forbidden
to serve it in any responsible capacity.[22][23]
A report concerning MRA by the Social and Industrial Council of the Church of England criticized MRA on three
counts: theology, psychology and social thinking. The report found theology woefully wanting in MRA. It said, "A
certain blindness to the duty of thinking is a characteristic... We have at times been haunted by a picture of the
movement, with its hectic heartiness, its mass gaiety and its reiterated slogans, as a colossal drive of escapism from
responsible living."[23][24]
Nazi leaders:
At the beginning of the 1930’s, Buchman kept in close touch with Germans active in the Oxford Group. Adolf Hitler
had, at first, presented himself as a defender of Christianity, declaring in 1928, "We shall not tolerate in our ranks
anyone who hurts Christian ideas.” Buchman was convinced that without a change in the heart of the National
Socialist regime, a world war would become inevitable. He also believed that any person, including the German
leaders, could find a living Christian faith with a commitment to Christ's moral values.[25]
Moni von Crammon, a German member of the Oxford Group, was the invited guest of Heinrich Himmler for the
Nuremberg Rally and she in turn invited Frank Buchman. Moni and Frank sat beside Heinrich Himmler at an
informal luncheon, where they discussed religion and politics. Due to his family background, Frank Buchman spoke
German fluently. Buchman and von Crammon attended two of the Nazi Party rallies, one in 1934 and the other in
1935. Von Crammon later claimed after the war, that her association with Himmler came as a result of her seeking
him out in the matter of her possible arrest, due to a piece of literature that was construed as anti-Nazi, found in her
possession by a maid.[26]
In August 1936, Frank Buchman was Heinrich Himmler's guest at the Berlin Olympics. Buchman offered to
introduce British Member of Parliament Kenneth Lindsay to Himmler, referring to Himmler as "a great lad.”[27]
Buchman added that Hitler himself was being most helpful to the Group, “He lets us have house-parties whenever
we like.” Buchman did not seem to think much of England or of Canada. England was in a terrible state, "seething
with Communism," and so was Canada. Lindsay disagreed; he thought that such an assessment showed that
Buchman really knew very little about England or Canada.[28] Oxford group member Garth Lean writes in his book
that according to Buchman's young followers who went with him, Himmler came in with his henchmen, gave a
propagandist account of Nazism and left, without giving Buchman a chance to speak.[29] Lean also cites a Danish
reporter, Jacob Kronika, who in January 1962 gave an account in a small newspaper he edited, the Flensborg Avis,
of a meeting in Berlin with Frank Buchman:
“Frank Buchman stayed at the Hotel Esplanade in Berlin. One day we ate lunch together. In the
afternoon he was to have a conversation with SS Chief Himmler, who had invited Dr Buchman to
come and see him. The conversation, of course, became a complete fiasco. Himmler could not, as
he intended, exploit the 'absolute obedience' of the MRA people towards God for the benefit of the
obedient slaves of the SS and the Nazis.”
The British Foreign Office had a different report. In a confidential minute dated 16 January 1939, Makins records
impressions Dr. Burckhardt had gained from his recent talks in Berlin. Asked whether he thought Himmler should
be included among the extremists or the moderates of the Nazis, Dr Burckhardt said Himmler had been very much
disgusted by the anti-Semitic outrages. He said Himmler was “a very curious character” and that both he and his
wife were members of the Oxford Group.[30]
Frank Buchman expressed concerns, stating, "Germany has come under the dominion of a terrible demoniac force.
A counter-action is urgent. We must ask God for guidance and strength to start an anti-demoniac counter-action
under the sign of the Cross of Christ in the democratic countries bordering on Germany, especially in the small
neighboring countries." [31]
In 1936 Buchman had hope that Germany could be diverted from its course. When he returned from the Berlin
Olympics he gave an interview to the New York World-Telegram.
"I thank Heaven for a man like Adolf Hitler, who built a front line of defense against the anti-Christ
of Communism," he said today in his book-lined office in the annex of Calvary Church, Fourth Ave
and 21st St. "My barber in London told me Hitler Nazis do Anti-Semitism? Bad, naturally. I
suppose Hitler sees a Karl Marx in every Jew. But think what it would mean to the world if Hitler
surrendered to the control of God. Or Mussolini. Or any dictator. Through such a man God could
control a nation overnight and solve every last, bewildering problem. The world won't listen to God,
but God has a plan for every person, for every nation. The world needs the dictatorship of the living
spirit of God. I like to put it this way: God is a perpetual broadcasting station and all you need to do
is tune in. What we need is a supernatural network of live wires across the world to every last man,
in every last place, in every last situation... Human ingenuity is not enough. That is why the ‘isms’
are pitted against each other and blood falls. Spain has taught us what godless Communism will
bring. Who would have dreamed that nuns would be running naked in the streets? Human problems
aren't economic. They're moral and they can't be solved by immoral measures. They could be solved
within a God-controlled democracy, or perhaps I should say a theocracy, and they could be solved
through a God-controlled Fascist dictatorship." [32][33]
The Rev. Garrett Stearly, one of Buchman's colleagues from Princeton University, said statements were taken out of
context. When Buchman was asked about Germany, he said that Germany needed a new Christian spirit, yet one had
to face the fact that Hitler had been a bulwark against Communism there -- and you could at least thank heaven for
that.[34]
The Oxford Group held a rally in Stockbridge, Massachusetts where the Marchers in the parade carried the flags of
48 States and 18 nations, including Germany's swastika. A negative comment on this drew the response that "the
Oxford Group bring nations together.”[35]
Of the thousands of Gestapo documents made available after the war,[36] Oxford Group member Garth Lean found
only three that concerned the Oxford Group. One suggests the Group was "a new and dangerous opponent of
National Socialism.” Another states it preaches revolution against the national state and has quite evidently become
its Christian opponent. The third, from 1942, says "No other Christian movement has underlined so strongly the
character of Christianity as being "supernational" and independent of all racial barriers... It tries fanatically to make
all men into brothers.” Lean claims the information source is a file called “Die Oxford- oder Gruppenbewegung,
Herausgegeben vom Sicherheitshauptamt, November 1936", Geheim, Nummeriertes Exemplar Nr. 1.”[37]
In 1938, after another Nuremberg rally and the Anschluss, Oxford Group members telephoned both Diana Mosley
and her sister Unity Mitford, who were in Munich at the time attending the celebrations. The Oxford members
requested an invitation and introduction to Adolf Hitler, for the purpose of "changing" him. The request was refused
by both Unity and Diana. Later that same evening Oxford Group members phoned Unity's father, Lord Redesdale,
who was also visiting Munich, making the same request. His reply was “no, damn it, I like the feller the way he
is.”[38] Travel writer and journalist Robert Byron, who had persuaded Hitler's English admirer Unity (Bobo)
Mitford, to include him in her party, entered in his diary, "Himmler apparently dotes on the Oxford Group and
writes to its English members discussing their troubles with them.”[39]
According to Oxford group member Garth Lean, during the war, the Oxford Group in Germany divided into three
parts. Some submitted to Himmler's demand that they cut all links with Buchman and the Oxford Group abroad. The
largest group continued the work of bringing Christian change to people under a different name,
Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Seelsorge (Working team for the Care of Souls), without being involved in politics and
always subject to surveillance. A third group joined the active opposition. Moni von Crammon's son-in-law was one
of those executed along with Adam von Trott zu Solz[40][41] They were executed under Hitler's orders after the 20
July plot.
Buchman's attempts to convert the Nazi leadership was condemned by Dietrich Bonhoeffer who wrote, "The Oxford
Group has been naïve enough to try to convert Hitler - a ridiculous failure to understand what is going on - it is we
who are to be converted, not Hitler."[42]
A report from the Social and Industrial Council of the Church of England also condemned Buchman's approach in
dealing with the Nazi regime, It stated, “It was surely this that led Dr. Buchman, so it is alleged, to believe that
through 'change' induced in Hitler there could come a 'God-controlled fascist dictatorship.' His error was not so
much that his appraisal of Hitler was so naive... but that he failed to see... that dictatorship is not bad just because it
has a bad man as dictator."[43]
Not a religion:
The Oxford Group literature defines the group as not being a religion, for it had "no hierarchy, no temples, no
endowments, its workers no salaries, no plans but God's plan." Their chief aim was "A new world order for Christ,
the King."[44] In fact one could not belong to the Oxford group for it had no membership list, badges, or definite
location. It was simply a group of people from all walks of life who have surrendered their life to God. Their
endeavor was to lead a spiritual life under God's Guidance and their purpose was to carry their message so others
could do the same.
The group was more like a religious revolution, unhampered by institutional ties, it combined social activities with
religion, it had no organized board of officers. The Group declared itself to be not an "organization" but an
"organism.” Though Frank Buchman was the group's founder and leader, group members believed their true leader
to be the Holy spirit and relied on God Control, meaning guidance received from God by those people who had fully
"surrendered" to God's will.[45] By working within all the churches, regardless of denomination, they drew new
members.[46] A newspaper account in 1933 described it as "personal evangelism -- one man talking to another or
one woman discussing her problems with another woman was the order of the day.”[47] In 1936, Good
Housekeeping described the Group having no membership, no dues, no paid leaders, no new theological creed, nor
regular meetings, it is simply a fellowship of people who desire to follow a way of life, a determination not a
denomination.[48]
The Four Absolutes:

Moral standards of absolute honesty, absolute purity, absolute unselfishness, and absolute love, though recognized
as impossible to attain, were guidelines to help determine whether a course of action was directed by God. In Oxford
terms sin, “anything that kept one from God or one another", "as contagious as any bodily disease.” "The soul needs
cleaning .”.. We all know ‘nice’ sinless sinners who need that surgical spiritual operation as keenly as the most
miserable sinner of us all.[49] Buchman's use of the four absolutes came through his teacher Robert E. Speer and his
book "the Principles of Jesus" and Speer's summarization of the Sermon on the Mount being the Oxford Groups
Four Absolutes test of right or wrong.
Spiritual practices:
To be spiritually reborn, the Oxford Group advocated four practices:[50]
1. The sharing of our sins and temptations with another Christian life given to God.
2. Surrender our life past, present and future, into God's keeping and direction.
3. Restitution to all whom we have wronged directly or indirectly.
4. Listening for God's guidance, and carrying it out.
Guidance:
The central practice to the Oxford/MRA members was guidance, which was usually sought in the "quiet time" of
early morning using pen and paper. The grouper would normally read the Bible or other spiritual literature, then take
time in quiet with pen and paper, seeking God's direction for the day ahead, trying to find God's perspective on
whatever issues were on the listener's mind. He or she would test their thoughts against the standards of absolute
honesty, purity, unselfishness and love, and normally check with a colleague.
Guidance was also sought collectively from groupers when they formed teams. They would take time in quiet, each
individual writing his or her sense of God's direction on the matter in question. They would then check with each
other, seeking consensus on the action to take.
Some church leaders criticized this practice, for example Rt. Rev. M. J. Browne, Bishop of Galloway wrote,
“Groupists actually speak of "listening -in" to the Holy Ghost whenever they run up against a difficulty they stop for
guidance. Such an idea of God is crudely anthropomorphic, derogatory to God's honour, and contrary to natural
morality... Guidance as understood by the Groups encourages all kinds of illusions, it undermines the sense of
personal moral responsibility, it leads to fanaticism."[51]
Buchman would share the thoughts which he felt were guided by God, but whether others pursued those thoughts
were up to them. He sent one member of the group a wire sharing his thought that the member should bring John D.
Rockefeller III to New York to have a chat with Queen Marie of Rumania. The member wired back that this might
be Frank Buchman's guidance but it was not his.[52] When some of Buchman's followers booked a second-class
passage, he told them rather sharply that he had been guided that they should change to first-class to form more
significant contacts.[53]
Oxford theologian, Dr. B H Streeter, stated that [54], throughout the ages, men and women have sought God's will
in quiet and listening. The Oxford Group, he wrote, was following a long tradition.
Sometimes groupers were banal in their descriptions of guidance. The cook for a large Oxford group gathering told
reporters that the menu was planned by God, another individual at a group gathering, who despite being a proud
Englishmen, was guided by God to completely surrender his national pride, and hoist the Stars and Stripes.[55]
However, The Oxford Group books and publications gave examples of groupers discovering creative initiatives
through times of quiet seeking God's direction.[56],[57]
Sharing:
In the Oxford Group, sharing was considered a necessity; it allowed one to be healed, therefore it was also a blessing
to share.[58] Sharing not only brought relief but honest sharing of sin and of victory over sin helped others to
openness about themselves. Sharing built trust. The sharing of our sins and temptations with another Christian life
given to God, and to use Sharing as witness, to help others, still unchanged, to recognize and acknowledge their sins.
The message one brings to others by speaking of one's own experiences, the power of God in guiding one's life
would bring hope to others that a spiritually changed life gives strength to overcome life’s difficulties.[59]
Some regarded this approach with cynicism. Time magazine wrote, “The first public confession can be stirring, but
the tenth is likely to strike one as the same old thing And the fatal suspicion arises that confessions are made not
through humility but to persuade. They sound a little too much coached, perfected to the point where they seem
artificial…”[60]
Beverley Nichols stated, "And all that business about telling one's sins in public.... It is spiritual nudism!"[61]
Margaret Rawlings, an actress, stood up at a 2000 member Group gathering and said, "this public exposure of the
soul, this psychic exhibitionism, with its natural accompaniment of sensual satisfaction, was as shocking, indecent
and indelicate as it would be if a man took all his clothes off in Piccadilly Circus.”[62] The act of Public
Confessions, brought criticism from outsiders who believed the Group had an undue interest in sex.[63]
Queen Marie of Romania stated, "I have met Buchman. I did not like him. He spoke of God as if He were the oldest
title in the Almanach de Gotha. And all that business about telling one's sins in public -- He wanted me ... me ... to
get up before my children and confess everything I had ever done! Ça se ne fait pas." [64]
However Cuthbert Bardsley, who worked with Buchman for some years and later became Bishop of Coventry, said,
“I never came across public confession in house parties - or very, very rarely. Frank tried to prevent it - and was
very annoyed if people ever trespassed beyond the bounds of decency.”[65] Buchman's biographer, Garth Lean, a
supporter of Buchman and promoter of the group, wrote that he attended meetings from 1932 on “and cannot recall
hearing any unwise public confessions.”
Five C's and Five Procedures:

The five C's: confidence, confession, conviction, conversion, and continuance was the process of life changing
undertaken by the life changer. Confidence, the new person had to have confidence in you and know you would
keep confidences. Confession, honesty about the real state of a persons life. Conviction, the seriousness of his sin
and the need to free of it. Conversion, the process had to be the persons own free will in the decision to surrender to
God. Continuance, you were responsible as a life changer to help the new person become all that God wanted him to
be. Only God could change a person and the work of the life changer had to be done under God's direction.[66]
Funding:
Though it was claimed by members that the Oxford group did not solicit funding, others have observed that the
Oxford Group/MRA did in fact solicit funding from members. In 1933, Alan Thornhill, Fellow and Chaplain of
Hertford College, Oxford, wrote in response to questions about the Oxford Group’s financing:
"The Oxford Group never asks for funds either by private or public appeal. The mythical
millionaires who are supposed to finance the work do not exist and never have existed. The gifts
received are given by friends who know that those gifts will be wisely spent in God’s service.
Where members of the Oxford Group undertake any corporate activity, scrupulously careful
accounts are kept. These are fully supervised, and open to anyone’s inspection. At the recent house
party, at which some 5,000 people were present, the average inclusive cost to each individual was
under 10 shillings a day. The Group has no paid secretaries. All the business arrangements for this
house party were carried out by a team of young people, mostly undergraduates. The charge of
extravagance is ill founded. And this is true also of the travelling team. Overseas teams, which
include the elderly as well as the young, travel either third class or tourist third in Atlantic liners.
Those who hold it against the Groups that the teams sometimes stay in large hotels have not
thought the matter out as a business proposition. These hotels not only make drastic cuts in their
prices for a large party, but also provide, free of charge, private sitting rooms and large halls for
big public meetings. Those who give up safe jobs or precious vacations to go on such travelling
teams do so always without salary and without security of any kind."[67]
A. J. Russell in his book, “For Sinners Only” stated Frank Buchman solicited help in written correspondence:
"One of the stiffest letters Frank permitted himself to write was to some persons who were
refusing to support him in a certain courageous action for the help of someone in need. Frank said
their refusal to extend the help where greatly needed might involve them in a crop of cares they
did not foresee at the moment. Fifty or sixty letters a day are nothing to Frank.”[68]
Marjorie Harrison in her book, “Saints Run Mad” stated, “The finances of the Group are a complete mystery. In
Canada the same perplexity was felt. How could a Team of fifty people travel by crack trains and stay in the best
hotels throughout an extended tour of the Dominion and the United States unless there were a very generous patron.
The Group states that it "never asks for funds by either public or private appeal. [55] Anyone doing so is disloyal to,
and in direct conflict with, the principle and practice of the Group." As one member put it to me, "There is no
collection or subscription. Quite. But what's in a name? At a House Party there is a ‘registration fee.’ This fee of five
shillings levied on five hundred people amounts to 125 pounds. Any religious organization that could make sure of
securing an average of five shillings from those participating in a concentrated activity would consider itself lucky....
There are large numbers of men and women who are attached to the Teams either as permanent workers or for long
periods of time at a stretch. Who pays their expenses? Are their relations and friends content that they should ‘live
on faith,’ which usually means living on other people? Or are they all people of substantial independent means?
Many of them are very young." [69]
Geoffrey Williamson in his book reported that funds were solicited by the Group:
"one of the Governors of the College of the Good Road (the Moral Re-Armament school on
Mackinac Island)... wound up his address with a request for funds to help carry on the good work
of Moral Re-Armament. I had been assured in London that the Buchmanites never made any
public appeal for funds. Yet here was Bernard Hallward, one of the movement's leading lights, not
only asking us for money, but asking in a big way. ‘We need three million francs!’ he declared,
‘and we need them urgently’."
He went on to explain that the money, which he was sure would be forthcoming, would be
allocated equally between three main enterprises. One million would go towards the maintenance
of Mountain House [the hotel in Caux, Switzerland]; one million towards the development of the
College of the Good Road, and one million would be used to complete the production of “The
Good Road” film. So, while a pianist played solemn music, ushers moved silently among the
audience with silver salvers which were soon heaped high with contributions. No loopholes were
allowed. Those without Swiss currency or who had left their cheque books behind were given
prepared slips bearing addresses in America, Australia, Britain, Ireland, and New Zealand to
which financial contributions could be sent on their return home. The fact that these slips had been
run off on a duplicator seemed to suggest that this practice was a fairly regular one. I felt that it
was as well that I had not played truant from that morning's assembly. My presence had at least
exploded the myth that the Buchmanites never appeal for funds.[70]
Carl Jung on the Oxford Group:

Carl Jung became aware of the Oxford Group in the 1920’s when Alphonse Maeder, his colleague and former
assistant, became involved with the movement. Although Jung recognized that troubled patients sometimes gained a
sense of security, purpose and belonging from Group involvement, in his view there was a sacrifice in personal
individuation. He therefore did not understand what attraction the group could have for someone with the
psychoanalytic sophistication of Maeder. For a time Jung was respectful of Maeder's convictions, but when his
relationship with Maeder deteriorated in the 1930’s his attitude toward the Oxford Group also became more
negative.[71]
Jung expressed this ambivalence toward the Group in a talk about the relationship of religion to mental health
around 1941. "A hysterical alcoholic was cured by this Group movement, and they used him as a sort of model and
sent him all round Europe, where he confessed so nicely and said that he had done wrong and how he had got cured
through the Group movement. And when he had repeated his story twenty, or it may have been fifty, times, he got
sick of it and took to drink again. The spiritual sensation had simply faded away. Now what are they going to do
with him? They say, now he is pathological, he must go to a doctor. See, in the first stage he has been cured by
Jesus, in the second by a doctor! I should and did refuse such a case. I sent the man back to these people and said, 'If
you believe that Jesus has cured this man, he will do it a second time. And if he can't do it, you don't suppose that I
can do it better than Jesus?' But that is just exactly what they do expect; when a man is pathological, Jesus won't
help him but the doctor will." [72]
Moral Re-Armament -- Pre-war

In 1938 Buchman made a speech in East Ham Town Hall, London, in which he stated, “The crisis is fundamentally
a moral one. The nations must re-arm morally. Morally recovery is essentially the forerunner of economic
recovery."[73] H. W. Austin edited the book Moral Rearmament (The Battle for Peace) that year.[74] Gradually the
former Oxford Group developed into Moral Re-Armament.
In Britain the Oxford Group/Moral Re-Armament was active throughout the country. The novelist Daphne du
Maurier published “Come Wind, Come Weather,” stories of ordinary Britons who had found hope and new life
through the Group. She dedicated it to Frank Buchman.[25]
Military exemption:
When war broke out, the British Government exempted about 30 Oxford Group workers from military service.
By 1940 Britain's Ernest Bevin, member of the Labour Party, put before Parliament that the Oxford Group members
would no longer be able to claim exemption from Military Service. Bevin disliked the Group for its recruitment of
the wealthy and influential in society and an implied linkage with the much earlier Oxford Movement led by
Cardinal John Henry Newman. The Oxford Group had garnered support as a result of two years of lobbying, and
approximately 2,500 clergy and ministers signed a petition opposing Bevins decision, as well as 174 Members of
Parliament.[75] However Bevin made a strong case stating that the Oxford group was the only religious organization
that had tried to claim such exemption, accused Buchman of supporting fascism,[75] and made it clear that he would
resign from the Government if he was defeated. The MRA/Oxford Group's parliamentary supporters did not speak
against Bevin's position and the result was the Oxford Group could no longer claim exemption from Military
Service.[76] Among Bevin's supporters was Tom Driberg, who described Buchman as a "soapy racketeer who never
repudiated his admiration for Hitler and Himmler."[77] Driberg was a strong supporter of social change, labor and
unions.[78] In 1992 Driberg was shown to have spied for the KGB in documents brought to Britain by defecting
KGB officer Vasili Mitrokhin, yet there was no evidence he did anything that harmed national security or put lives
at risk.[79]
In the United States, The Justice Department approved the stay of 28 British MRA workers as performing an
essential service. Senator (later President) Harry Truman, Chair of the Senate Committee investigating war
contracts, was one of six prominent Americans accused of “protecting draft-dodgers” and MRA was accused of
using Political influence to avoid the draft.[80] At a news conference Truman spoke in favor of MRA/Oxford group
stating they have already achieved remarkable results in bringing teamwork into industry, on the principles not of
"who's right" but of "what's right.”'[81] But in the end, 22 of the MRA workers were drafted. This does not mean
that Truman was integral to the group or that he understood its true nature or objectives.[82]
In 1944, journalist Georges Seldes warned Truman of the anti-Semitic and authoritarian tendencies of the Group,
Truman then running for Vice-President, distanced himself from it.[82] Time magazine reported that Truman , as
President of the United states, disclaimed any interest in the Oxford Group and said he never met Frank Buchman
though it was noted he had in the past spoke at a couple of Oxford Meetings.[83]
Oxford Group member, Garth Lean, in his book states, as a Senator Truman had read a message from President
Roosevelt at a Moral Re-Armament in Washington, where Buchman was also a speaker. He also had read account of
the demonstration into the Congressional Record, adding “It is rare in these days to find something which will unite
men and nations on a plane above conflict of party, class and political philosophy.” Buchman was in the Senate
gallery, at Truman's invitation.[84] Later, as President, Truman welcomed Buchman at a conference in San
Francisco which established the United Nations.[85]
Oxford Group investigated by MI5 British Intelligence:

In a document provided by MI5 British Security showed there was a fear that the Oxford Group might be a front for
Nazi propaganda as a result of Buchman's involvement with Nazi members. This created a number of investigations
from 1941–1950 , however, no evidence came to light that the group had been penetrated by the German Secret
Service.
After the War, the group encouraged an MRA approach to industrial relations, which became popularly associated
with the cause of the employers and against that of the unions in, for example, the docks and mines. Serious
consideration was given to allying with the MRA against British Communism, though the idea was rejected , ”..we
do not think it advisable to enter into any direct relations with MRA which might enable the latter to claim they have
common cause with HMG...we are not uninterested in the some success MRA have achieved in the conversion of
communists."[86]
Post-war:
At the end of the war, the MRA workers returned to the task of establishing a lasting peace. In 1946 MRA bought
and restored a large, derelict hotel at Caux in Switzerland, and this became a centre for reconciliation across Europe,
bringing together thousands including German Chancellor Adenauer and French Foreign Minister Robert
Schuman.[87]. Its work was described by historians Douglas Johnston and Cynthia Sampson as an “important
contribution to one of the greatest achievements in the entire record of modern statecraft: the astonishingly rapid
Franco-German reconciliation after 1945.”[88]
In the following decades MRA's work expanded across the globe, particularly into the African and Asian countries
moving towards independence from colonial rule. In 1956 King Mohammed V of Morocco sent a message to
Buchman, “I thank you for all you have done for Morocco in the course of these last testing years. Moral Re-
Armament must become for us Muslims as much an incentive as it is for you Christians and for all nations.”[89] In
1960 Archbishop Makarios and Dr Kucuk, President and Vice-President of Cyprus, jointly sent the first flag of
independent Cyprus to Frank Buchman at Caux in recognition of MRA's help.[90]
Oxford Group's position on labor and industry:

In Buchman's view, management and labour could “work together like the fingers on the hand,” and in order to
make that possible he aimed to answer “the self-will in management and labour who are both so right, and so
wrong.” MRA's role was to offer the experience which would free those people's hearts and minds from the
motivations or prejudices which prevent just solutions. [91]
Sir Patrick Joseph Henry Hannon, a Member of British Parliament and at one time a Group supporter, faulted the
"Buchmanites" for making claim that they settled three impending work stoppages in the Midlands by promoting the
Group's principles on management and labor. Sir Patrick's investigations found the trouble had been cured by pay
raises plus better working hours.[92] Tom Driberg, also a Member of Parliament, attacked the movement on
industrial grounds. Its program seemed "nothing less than spiritual strike-breaking," he said, adding that in his
opinion it was at its worst anti-socialist and anti-democratic.[93]
Time magazine reported, “The militantly anti-Communist International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, which
represents 97 unions in 73 countries, tossed a monkey wrench toward the machinery of Moral Re-Armament, the
nondenominational, un-theological, polite revival movement that evolved out of Frank Buchman's old Oxford
Group.” A report prepared by ICFTU's secretariat accused the Moral Re-Armament movement of interfering "with
trade-union activities and [making] anti-trade-union efforts, even to the extent of trying to found 'yellow unions’.”
MRA, it said, was undemocratic, “Bushman does not build up his movement from below... but from the ranks of
leaders.... The sources from which the Moral Re-Armament movement draws its necessary funds are completely
unknown. All that can be said is that those who supply the money must be very well off."[94][95]
However, the report was never presented to or voted on by the Congress itself, the only body entitled to make policy
statements on the Confederations' behalf. The report declared it had been prepared at the request of the Socialist
Trade Unions of India, Hind Mazda Saber. However, the Hind Mazda Saber’s President, Sunbathe Banners,
promptly denied that either or of his executive had made such a request.[96]
A similar situation arose when the Church of England's Social and Industrial Council investigated MRA, and
condemned its practices as a means of avoiding responsible living.[97] The Chair and a member of the Council
demonstrated their hostility to MRA during the investigation by writing a strongly critical letter to the Daily
Telegraph (13 Jan 1954); a letter answered by a strong statement by the Moderator of the Church of Scotland and
the leaders of all the Free Churches two days later. Their report was debated for two days by the Church Assembly,
which decided to receive it, but not adopt it.
William Gorgon, an International Vice-President of the American Transport Workers' Union, said that “between
1946 and 1953 national union leaders, local union officials, shop stewards and rank and file union members from 75
countries had received training” in MRA principles.[98] Everett Supers, for 20 years President of the Dutch
Confederation of Trades Unions, stated that “the thousands who have visited Caux have been deeply impressed by
its message for our age and by the real comradeship they found there.”[99] In France, Maurice Mercer, Secretary-
General of the textile workers within the Force Ouvriere, said, “Class war today means one half of humanity against
the other half, each possessing a powerful arsenal of destruction... Not one cry of hatred, not one hour of work lost,
one drop of blood shed -- that is the revolution to which MRA calls bosses and workers.”[100]
After the death of Buchman -- Peter Howard:

After Buchman's death in 1961, Peter Howard succeeded him. He was a political columnist who had been assigned
to write some pieces about MRA and ended up joining it. The royalties from his writing -- $1,120,000 -- went to the
cause. Under his leadership the group opened a center in Odawara, Japan. People, at this time, still attended MRA
conferences at its headquarters at Caux, Switzerland, and Mackinac Island, Michigan; in 1962 Peter Howard warned
Britain's Prime Minister Harold Wilson against "satirists and cynics" who "debase our ancient virtue and push
pornography and godlessness down the national gullet." MRA crusaded in Holland featuring big newspaper ads,
written by Howard, condemning the spread of homosexuality -- "It can be cured.” [101]
Garth Lean:
Garth Lean was instrumental in Peter Howard's conversion to the Oxford Group.[102] Geoffrey Williamson in his
book , reported that twenty-four years later, Garth Lean was still promoting Buchmanism to the newcomers, and that
Lean had become a member of the Council of Management of Moral Re-Armament.[103]
In 1965, “Up with People” was founded by members, and with the support, of Moral Re-Armament. In 2001, Moral
Re-Armament became “Initiatives of Change.”
Oxford Group -- Alcoholism and Alcoholics Anonymous:

In Akron, Ohio, Jim Newton, an Oxford Group member knew that one of Firestone's sons, Russell, was a serious
alcoholic. He took him first to a drying-out clinic and then on to an Oxford Group conference in Denver. The young
man gave his life to God, and thereafter enjoyed extended periods of sobriety. The family doctor called it a “medical
miracle.” Harvey Firestone Senior was so grateful that, in January 1933, he invited Buchman and a team of sixty to
conduct a ten-day campaign in Akron. They left behind them a strong functioning group which met each week in the
house of T. Henry Williams, amongst whom were an Akron surgeon, Bob Smith, and his wife Anne. Bob was a
secret drinker.[104]
Rowland Hazard claimed that it was Carl Jung who caused him to seek a spiritual solution to his alcoholism, which
led to Rowland joining the Oxford group. He was introduced by Shep Cornell to Cornell's friend Ebby Thacher;
Ebby had a serious drinking problem. Hazard introduced Ebby to Carl Jung's theory and then to the Oxford Group.
For a time Ebby took up residence at Sam Shoemaker's Calvary Rescue Mission.[105] Reverend Sam Shoemaker
ran the Calvary Rescue Mission that catered mainly to saving down-and-outs and drunks. Sam Shoemaker taught the
concept of God being that of one's understanding to the new inductees.[106]
Ebby Thacher, in keeping with the Oxford Teachings, needed to keep his own conversion experience real by
carrying the Oxford message of salvation to others. Ebby had heard of his old drinking buddy Bill Wilson was again
drinking heavily. Thacher and Cornell visited Wilson at his home and introduced him to the Oxford Group's
religious conversion cure. Wilson an agnostic, was "aghast" when Thacher told him he had "got religion.”[107]
A few days later, in a drunken state, Wilson went to the Calvary Rescue Mission in search of Ebby Thacher. It was
there that he attended his first Oxford Group meeting and would later describe the experience, “Penitents started
marching forward to the rail. Unaccountably impelled, I started too.... Soon, I knelt among the sweating, stinking
penitents... Afterward, Ebby... told me with relief that I had done all right and had given my life to God."[108] The
“Call to the Altar” did little to curb Wilson's drinking. A couple of days later, he re-admitted himself to Charles B.
Towns Hospital. Wilson had been admitted to Towns hospital three times earlier between 1933 and 1934. This
would be his fourth and last stay.[109]
Wilson did not obtain his spiritual awakening by his attendance at the Oxford Group. He had his "hot flash"
conversion at Town's Hospital. The hospital was set up and run by Charles B. Towns and his associate Dr.
Alexander Lambert, who together had concocted up a drug cocktail for the treatment of alcoholism that bordered on
quackery medicine known as “The Belladonna Cure.” The formula cure consisted of the two "deliriants" Atropa
belladonna and Hyoscyamus niger, which are were known to cause hallucinations. Wilson had his "hot flash"
spiritual awakening, while being treated with these drugs. He claimed to have seen a white light and when he told
his attending physician, Dr. William Silkworth about his experience, he was advised not to discount it. When Wilson
left the hospital he never drank again.[110].
After his release from the Hospital, Wilson attended Oxford Group meetings and went on a mission to save other
alcoholics. His prospects came through Towns Hospital and the Calvary Mission. Though he was not able to keep
one alcoholic sober, he found that by engaging in the activity of trying to convert others he was able to keep himself
sober. It was this realization, that he needed another alcoholic to work with, that brought him into contact with Dr.
Bob Smith while on a business trip in Akron Ohio. Earlier Wilson had been advised by Dr. Silkworth to change his
approach and tell the alcoholics they suffered from a disease, one that could kill them, and afterward apply the
Oxford Practices. This is what he brought to Bob Smith on their first meeting. Smith was the first alcoholic Wilson
helped to sobriety. Dr. Smith and Bill W. (as he was later called) went on to found Alcoholics Anonymous.
Wilson later acknowledged, “The early AA got its ideas of self-examination, acknowledgment of character defects,
restitution for harm done, and working with others straight from the Oxford Group and directly from Sam
Shoemaker, their former leader in America, and from nowhere else."
In 1939 James Houck joined the Oxford Group and became sober on Dec. 12, one day after Wilson did. AA was
founded on June 10, 1935, the first day of Dr. Bob's sobriety. Houck was the last surviving person to have attended
Oxford Group meetings with Wilson, who died in 1971. In September 2004, at the age of 98, Houck was still active
in the group, now renamed Moral Re-Armament, and it was his mission to restore the Oxford Group's spiritual
methods through the Back to Basics program, a twelve step program similar to AA. Houck believed the old Oxford
spiritual methods were stronger and more effective than the ones currently practiced in AA. Houck was trying to
introduce the program into the prison systems.[111]
Houck's assessment of Wilson's time in the Oxford group, “He was never interested in the things we were interested
in; he only wanted to talk about alcoholism; he was not interested in giving up smoking; he was a ladies man and
would brag of his sexual exploits with other members,” and in Houck's opinion he remained an agnostic.[112]
Sin as a Disease:
The Oxford Group was the first to address sin as a disease, hence a spiritual diagnoses was called for. Confession of
sin to another was a prerequisite for the spiritual conversion process to take place. “Groupers” viewed sin as
anything that stood between the individual and God. Sin frustrated Gods plan for oneself, and selfishness and self
centeredness were considered the key problems. Therefore if one could surrender one’s ego to God, then sin will go
with it. The Oxford Group believed the conversion process came in stages. Early AA gained the disease language
and concept of the need to surrender “one’s will” to a higher power from the Oxford Group; however AA expanded
on alcoholism as a physical problem as well as a lack of spirituality. In early AA Wilson addressed the issues of sin
and conversion.[113]
The AA concept of powerlessness is different from the Oxford Group. In AA, the bondage of an addictive disease
cannot be cured, only controlled; this is a departure from the Oxford Group belief , which stressed a spiritual
conversion would bring complete victory over sin.[113]
Oxford Group Recruitment Practices:

The Oxford Group grew massively between 1920 to the 1930’s. A number of religious organizations adopted these
strategies, now referred to as “spiritual retreats,” as well as the practice of individuals in open meetings sharing their
conversion experiences.[114] The first House Party began in China in 1918; this was to become a recognized
Oxford Group approach. By the summer of 1930 the first International House Party was held at Oxford, followed by
another the next year attended by 700 hundred people. By 1934 the International House Party had grown and was
attended by representatives from 40 nations, and by the 1935 meeting it had grown and was attended by 50 nations,
to the total of 10,000 representatives. The 1936 meeting at Birmingham drew 15,000 people and The First National
Assembly held in Massachusetts drew almost 10,000 people[115]
* The Oxford group employed teamwork. The people who were considered "changed" were
considered part of the whole team. Team guidance led to the selection of smaller units to direct
house parties, handle publicity, issue publications, manage bookstands, organize parades and to
conduct witness.[116]
* There were teams that traveled; many house parties featured out-of-town people who came to
the party to relate their experiences in the "Group Way of Life.” They tried to include celebrities
on traveling teams. Attendance was by printed invitation and sent by people active in the group. In
most cases the invitation would mention that prominent people would be present. Invitations were
also sent to "key people” in the community.[116]
* House parties were held in a variety of locations: a wealthy home, at a fashionable hotel, inn, or
summer resort, as well as outdoor camps, and at times, held in less fashionable locations such as a
college dorm. House parties were held lasting from a weekend up to two weeks. A house party
team would meet in advance for training and preparation. The teams would remain throughout the
meetings and handle a number of details. Oxford Group literature was on display.[116]
* Meetings followed no formal agenda and were not like church meetings, as singing and public
prayer were absent. Time was devoted to talks by the team members on subjects such as sin,
surrender, quiet time, the four absolutes, guidance, and intelligent witness. In most meetings
personal sharing of experience was undertaken by a team of up to 12 or more people. The informal
spirit was to set the guests at ease and allow for psychological barriers to fall. After a day or two
many guests would feel uncomfortable and to release the discomfort would be encouraged by
Group workers to undergo the "surrender experience.”[116]
The use of slogans:

Most were coined through Buchman's quiet time; he knew slogans would catch attention, be more easily
remembered, and more readily repeated. They provided simple answers to problems people face in themselves and
others. A few are listed below [117]
* Pray: stands for Powerful Radiograms Always Yours

* Constipated Christians
* Come clean
* Every man is a force, not a field
* Interesting sinners make compelling saints
* When a man listens, God speaks
* A spiritual radiophone in every home
* Sin blinds and sin binds
* World changing through life-changing
Oxford Group literature:

Some of the Oxford Group literature is available online. See references. “For Sinners Only” by Arthur James Russell
was characterized as the Oxford Group "bible."[118] “Soul Surgery” by H. A. Walter,[119] “What is the Oxford
Group” by Layman,[120] and “Eight Points of the Oxford Group” by C. Irving Benson.[121]
For alcoholics there were three autobiographies by Oxford members who were active alcoholics which were
published in the 1930’s. These books provided accounts of the alcoholics' failed attempts to make their lives
meaningful until, as a result of their Oxford membership, they found a transformation in their lives and sobriety
through surrendering to God. The stories contained in Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book, are very similar in style to
these much earlier works.[122] The books were “The Big Bender,” “Life Began Yesterday” and “I Was Pagan” by
V.C. Kitchen.[123]
Published literature critical of the Oxford Group:

In 1934 Marjorie Harrison, an Episcopal Church member, published a book “Saints Run Mad,” that challenged the
Group, its leader and their practices. [124] {Note Book is available online}
Theologian Reinhold Niebuhr criticized Buchman's philosophy and pursuit of the wealthy and powerful:
“The idea is that if the man of power can be converted, God will be able to control a larger area of
human life through his power than if a little man were converted. This is the logic which has filled
the Buchmanites with touching solicitude for the souls of such men as Henry Ford or Harvey
Firestone." [125]
Buchman prompted them to whisper confidentially from time to time that these men were on the very threshold of
the kingdom of God. It is this strategy which prompts or justifies the first-class travel of all the Oxford teams. They
hope to make contact with big men in the luxurious first-class quarters of ocean liners.[125] He called the Oxford
Group “religiously vapid” and “socially vicious.”
Walter Houston Clark, in his book, “The Oxford Group: Its History and Significance,” writes of the Buchmanites
living off the wealthy:
"A small minority of the specially dedicated among the Group, led by the example of Buchman
himself, ‘live on faith’ by which is meant that they rely on God to guide others to take care of their
material needs. .... There are some evangelists who could not travel in the sumptuous fashion that
characterizes the trips of Dr. Buchman without a twinge of conscience. There has been some
criticism of the Group on account of this, and there is even occasionally heard the suggestion that
it is a kind of money-making racket. However, that gentleman apparently never questions the
propriety of lavish expenditures when the money is there and the cause is a good one. Living on
faith has not always been an easy adventure, and he has known what it means not to know from
whence his next meal was coming; but he has always been sure that "where God guides, He
provides.”[126]
Geoffrey Williamson in his book, “Inside Buchmanism,” faulted the organization for its lack of Charity. "The whole
movement is supported by charitable gifts. But when I asked at headquarters whether it dispensed any charity, the
reply was a frank and emphatic, ‘No.’ No matter how sincere the followers of Buchmanism may be, no matter how
zealously they may work for the cause; no matter how honest their beliefs, I cannot understand how they can
possibly justify their actions simply by saying, ‘Where God guides, He provides’." "I dislike their forced heartiness
and the way in which they fawn upon the wealthy and the titled. I dislike their flattery and the way they pander to
snobbish instincts. They may possibly claim that they are only exploiting human failings in others to bring people to
their meetings. It still revolts me." "During my stay at Caux I amassed a great collection of leaflets and pamphlets.
They were filled with the same sort of stuff. Thousands of words about "ideology," but not one mention of "the
advancement of the Christian religion." [127]
Polish author Rom Landau in his appraisal of nine cultists credited Frank Buchman with being "the most successful
and shrewdest revivalist of our time." Landau found Buchman's movement theologically frivolous. He criticized the
Oxford Group's practice of suppressing or "sublimating" the sex impulse and stated with much sarcasm the "Five
'sublimated' Arabs, Italians or Frenchmen, would prove the efficacy of Buchman's sex methods more convincingly
than 500 English undergraduates." [128][129]
John Haynes Holmes, pastor of the Community Church, characterized the Oxford Group Movement yesterday as
"revivalism for the rich and respectable." He praised its leader, Dr. Frank Buchman, for "discovering that lost souls
are quite as common among the upper, as among the lower classes of society." But in commenting on one of the
Oxford group meetings "in the glittering splendor of the ballroom of the Plaza Hotel," in contrast with social misery
elsewhere, he said, “I count it blasphemy for Dr. Buchman, or anybody else, to pretend to testify to what God has
done for him while humanity is at this moment perishing.”[130]
Moral Re-Armament -- Post-war years
In the post war years Moral Re-Armament (MRA) widened its activities to provide "an ideology for
democracy.”[131] In 2001, Moral Re-Armament became “Initiatives of Change.”
Decline of the Oxford Group:

In November 1941, MRA/Oxford Group was ousted by Rev. Sam Shoemaker from its New York headquarters in
Manhattan's Calvary Episcopal Church. Shoemaker believed that Buchman had strayed from his principles. where
"Buchmanism" was meant to make Baptists “better Baptists” and Catholics “better Catholics.” In the U.S. and
Britain Buchman lost followers.[132] Shoemaker stated, “When the Oxford Group was, on its own definition, a
movement of vital personal religion, working within the churches to make the principles of the New Testament
practical as a working force today, we fully identified ourselves with it," declared the Rev Shoemaker. "Certain
policies and points of view, however, have arisen in the development of Moral Re-Armament about which we have
had increasing misgivings." [133]
Walter H. Clark, a master at the Lenox School in Lenox, Massachusetts, in doing his thesis on Buchmanism
produced some findings from a questionnaire he submitted to 92 men and women who had been involved with the
Oxford group for 18 years previous.
His findings were that only 12% were still active in the group. Median income was $5000– $10000 with 28%
earning over $10,000. Buchman aimed at the “up and outs;” forty-five percent said the group did not benefit them
intellectually while 7% said it did. Both among the “people who stayed “and the “people who left” stated that the
main benefit was emotional release, however many felt it was an emotional spree which left them distrustful of all
religions.[134][135]
Influences:
Because of its influence on the lives of several highly prominent individuals, the Group attracted highly visible
members of society, including members of the British Parliament and other European leaders[136] and such
prominent Britons as C.S. Lewis (who was a student at the time at Oxford), an Anonymous Duchess of England
among other Royalty, and Americans, Rowland Hazard III, the Firestone family, founders of the Firestone Tire and
Rubber Company of Ohio.[137] The Group attracted opposition from the Roman Catholic Church,[138] though this
changed after Vatican II. In 1993 Cardinal Franz Koenig, Archbishop of Vienna, wrote that “Buchman was a
turning-point in the history of the modern world through his ideas.”[139] The Group grew into a well-known,
informal and international network of people by the 1930’s. The London newspaper editor Arthur J. Russell joined
the Group after attending a meeting in 1931. He wrote “For Sinners Only” in 1932, which went through 17 editions
in Britain alone, and was translated into many languages.
References
1. Tom Driberg, The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament: A Study of Frank Buchman and His Movement, p. 11-12
p.52, Secker & Warburg, 1964
2. Mercadante, Linda "Victims and Sinners" p. 55 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996-01-01
ISBN 978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
3. Time Magazine Cover, 1936 http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19360420,00.html
4. Time Magazine 1961 "The Moral Re-Armer
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,872696,00.html
5. Mercadante, Linda "Victims and Sinners" p. 51 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996-01-01
ISBN 978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
6. Mercadante, Linda "Victims and Sinners" p. 50-51 p.50. Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996,
ISBN 978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
7. Mercadante, Linda "Victims and Sinners" p. 54 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996, ISBN
978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
8. Pittman Bill "AA the Way it Began" Glen Abbey Books , 1988
9. a b Buchman F, Remaking the World London: Blandord Press, 1961
10. Time Magazine, October 14, 1935, "In Geneva Groupers"
11. Time Magazine, "Men, Masters and Messiahs"
12. Tom Driberg, The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament, p. 52 & 53
13. Time Magazine "Oxford V. Group"
14. March 6, 1939; Lean, Garth; Frank Buchman – a life, Constable 1985, p282
15. Time Magazine Oxford Group Ltd.http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,761537,00.html
16. Tidens Tegn, 24 Dec 1934
17. Lean, Garth; Frank Buchman - a life; Constable 1985, p232
18. a b Lean, Garth: Frank Buchman - a life; Constable 1985
19. Remaking the World, p78
20. Message through Karen Petersen, written to Buchman by Irene Gates, 23 Oct 1943
21. Mercadante, Linda "Victims and Sinners" p. 51 *50 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996, ISBN
978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
22. The New York Times, December 10, 1957, page 21.
23. a b The New York Times, June 18, 1952, page 8
24. Time Magazine "Report on MRA February 14th, 1955
25. a b Lean, Garth; Frank Buchman — a life; Constable 1985
26. Lean, Garth “Frank Buchman" P. 207 References
27. Driberg, Tom "The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament p.64-65
28. Driberg Tom, "The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament; A Study of Frank Buchman and His Tom Driberg, 1965,
pages 64-65.
29. /Lean, Frank Buchman, p. 238
30. Himmler Forest Office Documents "1939 – Himmler’s character.” C52/15/18 FO/371/22960
http://www.fpp.co.uk/Himmler/Himmler_FO_PRO.html
31. >/Lean, Garth " Frank Buchman" P 238
32. Driberg, Tom The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament; A Study of Frank Buchman and His Movement, , 1965,
pages 68-69.
33. Time Magazine 1936, "God Controlled Dictatorship"
34. Lean, Frank Buchman, p. 239
35. Time Magazine "Groupers in Stockbridge"
36. The National Archives: (Record Group 242)The National Archives, “National Archives Collection of Foreign
Records Seized"
37. Lean, Garth Frank Buchman, p. 242
38. David Pryce-Jones, Unity Mitford: A Quest, London 1976, page 167.
39. Byron Robert, Specator 22.8 1987, Robert Byrons Diary, 1938 p.22-3
40. Lean, Frank Buchman, 242
41. Edward Luttwak, "Franco-German Reconciliation: The Overlooked Role of the Moral Re-Armament
Movement" in Religion, the Missing Dimension of Statecraft, edited by Douglas Johnston and Cynthia Sampson,
OUP, page 38
42. Eberhard Bethge, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, 282-284
43. Time Magazine " Report on M.R.A http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,807024,00.html
44. What is Oxford Group, Layman with a Notebook p.19 1933
45. Pittman, Bill, AA the Way it Began, p. 113 Glenn Abbey Books, 1988
46. What is Oxford Group p.6, 1933
48. Pass It On, p. 170, Alcoholics World Service Inc. 1984
49. What is the Oxford Group p. 11-16
50. What is the Oxford Group, p. 9
51. Tom Driberg, The Mystery of Moral Re-armament: A Study of Frank Buchman and His Movement, p. 192-
201 Martin Secker and Warburg Limited, 1964
52. Time Magazine, "To End a Scandal", http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,872486-7,00.html
53. American Magazine, Smith Jr. , B.W. "Buchman — Surgeon of Souls" November 1936, page 151.
54. Streeter, DR. B. H, " The God Who Speaks" , Macmillan, 1936
55. Tom Driberg, The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament, p. 59
56. Russell, A. J, "For Sinners Only" Hodder and Stoughton, 1932
57. Lean Garth, Constable, 1985
58. What is Oxford p.19- 21
59. Layman with a Notebook, What is Oxford p.25
60. Time Magazine 1947, "Confessions at Caux January 7 ,
61. Nichols, Beverely , All I Could Never Be, pages 255-256.
62. Driberg, Tom, The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament; A Study of Frank Buchman and His Movement, 1965,
page 55.
63. Time Magazine, "To Change The World.”
64. Nichols, Beverely "All I could Never Be" pages 255-256 Publisher Dutton 1952
65. Lean, Garth; Frank Buchman - a life, Constable 1985, p139
66. Garth Lean, Frank Buchman a Life, p. 79 William Collins and Sons & C. Limited, Glasgow 1985.
67. King, S A; The Challenge of the Oxford Groups; Allenson and Co Ltd, 1933, p74
68. Russell, A. J. "For Sinners Only" Publisher: Hats Off Books Date Published: 2003 ISBN 978-1-58736-178-4
ISBN 1-58736-178-7
69. Harrison, Marjorie (1934), Saints Run Mad; A Criticism of the "Oxford" Group Movement ~ pages 103-105.
http://www.morerevealed.com/library/saints/saints.jsp
70. Williamson, Geoffrey, "Inside Buchmanism; an independent inquiry into the Oxford Group Movement and
Moral Re-Armament, Philosophical Library, New York, c1954, pages 90-91.
71. C.G. Jung Letters, selected and edited by Gerhard Adler in collaboration with Aniela Jaffe, trans. R.F.C. Hull,
Volume 1.
72. Carl Jung, The Symbolic Life, p. 272
73. Buchman, Frank N.D., Remaking the World (London, 1955), p. 46.
74. Lean, Garth Frank Buchman - a life, p279
75. a b Time Magazine Oct 20 1941, "Frank & Ernest"
76. Time Magazine "Less Buchmanism" http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,801317,00.html
77. Time Magazine March 13, 1946 Return of the Prophet
78. Tom Driberg, 'Ruling Passions' (Quintet 1978), and Simon Ball, The Guardsmen, Harold Macmillan, Three
Friends and the World They Made, (London: Harper Collins, 2004)
79. BBC News, 13 Sept 1999
80. The New York World Telegram January 4th, 1943 "Board cites Draft Act Tampering-Says Buchmanites used
political influence to avoid military service"
81. Lean, Garth Frank Buchman - a life, p. 324
82. a b Miscamble, Wilson D, "From Roosevelt to Truman: Potsdam, Hiroshima, and the Cold War", Cambridge
University Press, 2006 , P. 14, ISBN 978-0-521-86244-8
83. Time Magazine August 14th , 1944 "The Candidates and their Churches"
http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,775168,00.html
84. Lean, Garth: Frank Buchman - a life, p285
85. Lean, Garth: Frank Buchman - a life, p329
86. MI5 Security Page, September 4, 2007, Right Wing Extremists and Groups
87. Lean, Garth Frank Buchman -a life, p 382
88. Johnston and Sampson, Religion, the Missing Dimension of Statecraft, Oxford University Press, 1994
89. Lean, Garth Frank Buchman - a life, p 454
90. Lean, Garth Frank Buchman - a life, p 524
91. Cantril, Hadley, "The Psychology of Social Movements P. Publisher Transaction p. 153 , 2002 ISBN 978-0-
7658-0089-3
92. Time Magazine, Less Buchmanism November 24, 1941
93. The New York Times , "DR. BUCHMAN'S GROUPSCORED IN COMMONS" July 6, 1946,
94. Time Magazine October, 1953 Word and Work http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,858355,00.html
95. Time Magazine October, 1953 Word and Work http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,858355,00.html
96. Lean, Garth; Frank Buchman - a Life; Constable 1985, p432
97. Time Magazine, The Moral Rearmer August 18, 1961
98. Grogan, William; John Riffe of the Steelworkers, Coward, McCann 1959, p140
99. Foreword to 'World Labour and Caux', Caux 1950
100. Piguet and Sentis, 'Ce Monde que Dieu nous confie, Centurion 1979, p64
101. Time Magazine, "New Man at MRA", October 30, 1964
102. Howard , Peter, "Innocent Men" 1941, P. 27, 29 to 31, 33, 34, 43 to 46, 49, 97.
103. Geoffrey Williamson, Geoffrey " Inside Buchmanism: an independent inquiry into the Oxford Group
Movement and Moral Re-Armament" , Philosophical Library, New York, c1954, page 5.
104. Lean Garth, Frank Buchman: A Life. p. 151-152 London: Constable, 1985 p.
105. 1984) Pass It On: The Story of Bill Wilson and how the A.A. message reached the world. New York:
Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. ISBN 0-916856-12-7, pp. 381-386
106. Hartigan, Francis "Bill W."
107. Pass It On (New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc, 1984), p. 131-139
108. Alcoholics Anonymous "Pass It On" p. 118 New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services 1984
109. Pittman, Bill, AA the Way it Began, p.150
110. Pittman, Bill, AA the way it Began, p. 83-87, p. 165-167 Glenn Abbey Books 1988
111. Towson, Melissa, Time Magazine, "Living Recovery"
112. Hartigan, Francis "Bill W"
113. a b Mercandte, Linda A, "Victims and Sinners": p. 61-62 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Date 1996-
01-01 ISBN 978-0-664-25508-4 ISBN 0-664-25508-6
114. Pittman, Bill, AA the Way it Began, p.120-130
115. Pittman, Bill, AA the Way it Began, p. 117-121
116. a b c d Pittman, The way it Began, p. 123-128
117. Pittman, Bill, AA the Way it Began, p. 129
118. Amazon.com site on "For Sinners Only"
119. Soul Surgery
120. What is the Oxford Group
121. Eight Points of the Oxford Group
122. Bill Pittman, AA The Way it Began, p.176, 1988, Glen Abbey Books, IBSN87-73390
123. Kitchen, V.C. I was a Pagan http://stepstudy.org/downloads-2/
124. Saints Run Mad
125. a b Niebuhr, Reinhold, Christianity and Power Politics, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1940, "Hitler and
Buchman.”
126. Clark, Walter Houston, The Oxford Group; Its History and Significance, pages 33-34.
127. Williamson, Geoffrey, Inside Buchmanism; an independent inquiry into the Oxford Group Movement and
Moral Re-Armament, Philosophical Library, New York, c1954, pages 220-221, and 159-160
128. Landua, Rom, Publisher New York AA, Knoph 1936, God is My Adventure a Book on modern mystics,
masters and teachers
129. 'Time Magazine', "Men, Masters and Messiahs"
130. The New York Times July 16th, 1934 Oxford Group Praised and Chided
131. Tom Driberg, The Mystery of Moral Re-Armament: A Study of Frank Buchman and His Movement, p. 11-12,
Secker & Warburg, 1964
132. Time Magazine, "Less Buchmanism"] November 1941
133. Williamson, Geoffrey, "Inside Buchmanism: an independent inquiry into the Oxford Group Movement and
Moral Re-Armament" p.210,
134. Time Magazine, Jan 4th, 1943 "Report on Buchmanism"
135. Austin , Henry Wilferd, "Frank Buchman as I Knew Him" p. 98 Published by Grosvenor Books, 1975 ISBN
0-901269-16-6, 9780901269164
136. Moral Rearmament. Time, September 19, 1938.
137. Hartigan, Francis (2000). Bill W.: A Biography of Alcoholics Anonymous Cofounder Bill Wilson. New York:
St. Martin's Press, pp. 78-79.
138. Kurtz, Ernest (1988). AA: The Story, a revised edition of Not God: A History of Alcoholics Anonymous. New
York: Harper & Row, p. 47.
139. Lean, Garth; Frank Buchman - a life; Constable 1985, p2
External links
 Frank N.D. Buchman at "An Illustrated Alcoholics Anonymous Bibliography"

Alcoholics Anonymous
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is an international mutual aid movement claiming more than 2 million members,
declaring its "primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics achieve sobriety;” it was founded in 1935
by Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith (Bill W. and Dr. Bob) in Akron, Ohio.[1][2] With other early members, Wilson
and Smith developed AA's program of spiritual and character development, “The Twelve Steps.” “The Twelve
Traditions” are AA's recommendations for its groups, stressing anonymity, altruism, and inclusion of all who want
to stop drinking. The Traditions also recommend that AA groups try to steer clear of dogma, hierarchies and
involvement in public issues. Subsequent fellowships, such as Narcotics Anonymous, have adapted the Twelve
Steps and the Twelve Traditions.[3][4]
AA's first female member, Florence Rankin, joined in 1936, and the first non-Protestant member, a Roman Catholic,
joined in 1939.[5][6] AA membership has since spread "across diverse cultures holding different beliefs and values,"
including geopolitical areas resistant to grassroot movements.[7]
Although AA views discussions on the medical nature of alcoholism as beyond its scope, AA is regarded as a
proponent and "popularizer" of the disease theory of alcoholism.[3][8][9][10] The American Psychiatric Association
has recommended sustained treatment in conjunction with AA's program, or similar community resources, for
chronic alcoholics unresponsive to brief treatment.[11] AA's own data state that 64% drop out of AA in their first
year,[12][13] but its program is credited with helping many alcoholics achieve and maintain sobriety.[14]
AA's name derived from its first book, titled “Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How More Than One Hundred
Men Have Recovered From Alcoholism” (for subsequent editions the subtitle read .”..Many Thousands of Men and
Women...)." Informally called "the Big Book," it describes AA's program, details its early history, and contains brief
autobiographical sketches of AA members. In subsequent editions, the first 164 pages of the Big Book have stayed
virtually unchanged, while the autobiographical stories which make up the latter half of the book have been subject
to removal, addition, or re-titling.
Beginnings -- History of Alcoholics Anonymous:

AA sprang from The Oxford Group, a non-denominational movement modeled on first-century Christianity.[15]
Group members ("Groupers") were not primarily focused on sobriety, but those such as Ebby Thacher found
membership in the group an aid in staying sober. In keeping with the evangelistic teachings of the Group that one
must convert other alcoholics to keep one's conversion to sobriety, Thacher sought out his former drinking buddy
Bill Wilson. Thacher told Wilson he was sober because he "got religion," and that he could do likewise if he set his
objections to religion to form a personal conception of God, "another power" or a "higher power.”[16][17][18]
Sensing a "shared a kinship of common suffering," and awed that a seemingly hopeless alcoholic like Thacher could
be sober, Wilson attended a Group gathering though he was noticeably drunk. Regardless, Wilson became
convinced that he could get sober, and within days of meeting Thacher had himself readmitted to the “Charles B.
Towns Hospital” for the fourth time to dry out; Wilson went drinking on the way there four beers, the last amount of
alcohol he ever consumed. Under the care of Dr. William Duncan Silkworth (a key early supporter and benefactor of
A.A.), Wilson "detoxed" while being treated with a combination of drugs that included the hallucinogen
Belladonna.[19] At one point in the hospital, Wilson found himself in a state of despair until he underwent a
profound and ecstatic experience in which, he reported, that God showed himself to him in a bright light.[20]
Upon release from the hospital, Wilson joined the Oxford Group and began attempting to help others become sober,
but with limited success. Dr. Silkworth advised his patient that he was pushing religion too hard and should focus
instead on "the science" of alcoholism. Wilson' first success came during a business trip to Akron, Ohio. He was
introduced to Dr. Robert Smith, a surgeon and Oxford Group member who was unable to stay sober. After thirty
days of working with Wilson, Smith had his last drink on June 10, 1935, the date marked by AA for its
anniversary.[20][21]
While Wilson and Smith credited their sustained sobriety by working with alcoholics under the auspices of the
group, a Group associate pastor sermonized against Wilson for forming a "secret, ashamed sub-group" engaged in
"divergent works.”[21] By 1937 Wilson separated from the Oxford Group.
AA historian Ernest Kurtz explained the split:
.”..more and more, Bill discovered that new adherents could get sober by believing in each other
and in the strength of this group. Men [no women were members yet] who had proven over and
over again, by extremely painful experience, that they could not get sober on their own had
somehow become more powerful when two or three of them worked on their common problem.
This, then—whatever it was that occurred among them—was what they could accept as a power
greater than themselves. They did not need the Oxford Group." [22]
In 1955 Wilson acknowledged AA's debt, saying "The Oxford Groupers had clearly shown us what to do. And just
as importantly, we learned from them what not to do." Among the Oxford Group practices AA retained were
informal gatherings, a "changed-life" developed through "stages", and working with others for no material gain.
AA's analogs for these are meetings, "the steps," and sponsorship. Anonymity came about as AA wished to avoid
the publicity-seeking practices of the Oxford Group and to not promote itself; Wilson said, "erratic public characters
who through broken anonymity might get drunk and destroy confidence in us." [23]
The Big Book, the Twelve Steps and the Twelve Traditions:
In 1937, Wilson and Smith could count 40 alcoholic men they had helped to get sober, and two years later they
counted 100 members, including one woman. To promote the fellowship, Wilson and other members wrote the
initially-titled book, “Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How More Than One Hundred Men Have Recovered
from Alcoholism,”[24] from which AA drew its name. Informally known as "The Big Book" (with its first 164
pages virtually unchanged since the 1939 edition), it suggests a twelve-step program in which members admit that
they are powerless over alcohol and need help from a "higher power;" seek guidance and strength through prayer
and meditation from a God (or Higher Power) of their own understanding; take a moral inventory with care to
include resentments; list and become ready to remove character defects; list and make amends to those harmed, and
then try to help other alcoholics recover. The second half of the book, "Personal Stories" (subject to additions,
removal and re-titling in subsequent editions), is made of AA members' redemptive autobiographical sketches.
In 1941, interviews on American radio and favorable articles in US magazines, including a piece by Jack Alexander
in “The Saturday Evening Post,” led to increased book sales and membership.[25] By 1946, as the growing
fellowship quarreled over structure, purpose, and authority, as well as finances and publicity, Wilson began to form
and promote what became known as AA's “Twelve Traditions” -- guidelines for an altruistic, unaffiliated, non-
coercive, and non-hierarchical structure that limited AA's purpose to only helping alcoholics on a non-professional
level while shunning publicity. Eventually he gained formal adoption and inclusion of the Twelve Traditions in all
future editions of the Big Book.[3] At the 1955 St. Louis convention in Missouri, Wilson relinquished stewardship
of AA to the General Service Conference,[26] as AA grew to millions of members internationally.[27]
Organization and finances:

AA says it is "not organized in the formal or political sense,"[27] and Bill Wilson called it a "benign anarchy.”[28]
In Ireland, Shane Butler reported that AA is an import that “looks like it couldn’t survive as there’s no leadership or
top-level telling local ‘cumanns’ what to do, but it has worked and proved itself extremely robust.” Butler added that
"the AA’s 'inverted pyramid' style of governance has helped it to avoid many of the pitfalls that political and
religious institutions have encountered since it was established here in 1946."[29]
In 2006 AA counted 1,867,212 members and 106,202 AA groups worldwide.[27] The Twelve Traditions informally
guide how individual AA groups function, and the “Twelve Concepts for World Service” guide how the
organization is structured globally.[30]
A member who accepts a service position or an organizing role is a "trusted servant" with terms rotating and limited,
typically lasting three months to two years and determined by group vote and the nature of the position. Each group
is a self-governing entity with AA World Services acting only in an advisory capacity. AA is served entirely by
alcoholics, except for seven "nonalcoholic friends of the fellowship" of the 21-member AA Board of Trustees.[27]
AA groups are self-supporting, relying on voluntary donations from members to cover expenses.[27] AA GSO
limits contributions to US $3,000 a year.[31] Above the group level, AA may hire outside professionals for services
that require specialized expertise or full-time responsibilities.[3]
AA receives proceeds from books and literature that constitute more than 50% of the income for its General Service
Office (GSO).[32] Unlike individual groups, the GSO is not self-supporting and maintains a small salaried staff. It
also maintains service centers which coordinate activities such as printing literature, responding to public inquiries,
and organizing conferences. They are funded by local members and responsible to the AA groups they represent.
Other International General Service Offices (Australia, Costa Rica, Russia, etc.) are independent of AA World
Services in New York.[33]
Program:
The scope of AA's program is much broader than just abstinence from drinking alcohol.[34] Its goal is to effect
enough change in the alcoholic's thinking "to bring about recovery from alcoholism"[35] while abstaining from
alcohol, “one day at a time.” A spiritual awakening is achieved by following the Twelve Steps,[36] and sobriety is
furthered by volunteering for AA[37] and regular AA meeting attendance[38] or contact with AA members.[36]
Members are encouraged to find an experienced fellow alcoholic, called a sponsor, to help them understand and
follow the AA program. The sponsor should preferably have experience of all twelve of the steps, be the same
gender as the sponsored person, and refrain from imposing personal views on the sponsored person.[39] Following
the helper therapy principle, sponsors in AA benefit as much, if not more, from their relationship than do those they
sponsor. Helping behaviors correlate with increased abstinence and lower probabilities of binge drinking.[40]
AA's program is an inheritor of “Counter-Enlightenment” philosophy. AA shares the view that acceptance of one's
inherent limitations is critical to finding one's proper place among other humans and God. Such ideas are described
as "Counter-Enlightenment" because they are contrary to the Enlightenment's ideal that humans have the capacity to
make their lives and societies a heaven on earth using their own power and reason.[34]
Sociologists David Rudy and Arthur Greil evaluated AA's literature and observed AA meetings for sixteen months.
They note that although AA's ideology denies AA is religious in nature, for an AA member to remain sober a high
level of commitment is necessary. This commitment is facilitated by a change in the member's world view. To help
members stay sober AA must, they argue, provide an all-encompassing world view while creating and sustaining an
atmosphere of transcendence in the organization (God is completely outside of and beyond the world). To be all-
encompassing, AA's ideology places an emphasis on tolerance rather than on a narrow religious world view that
could make the organization unpalatable to potential members and thereby limit its effectiveness. AA's emphasis on
the spiritual nature of its program, however, is necessary to institutionalize a feeling of transcendence. A tension
results from the risk that the necessity of transcendence, if taken too literally, would compromise AA's efforts to
maintain a broad appeal. As this tension is an integral part of AA, Rudy and Greil argue that AA is best described as
a quasi-religious organization.[41]
Meetings:
AA meetings are "quasi-ritualized therapeutic sessions run by and for, alcoholics.”[42] They are usually informal
and often feature discussions. Local AA directories list a variety of weekly meetings. Those listed as "closed" are
only for those with "a desire to stop drinking",[3] while "open" meetings are available to anyone. At speaker
meetings one or two members tell their stories, while discussion meetings allocate the most time for general
discussion. Some meetings are devoted to studying and discussing the AA literature. Except for men's and women's
meetings, most meetings for specific demographics (including newcomers, gays, and young people) do not exclude
other alcoholics. While AA has pamphlets that suggest meeting formats,[43][44] groups have the autonomy to hold
and conduct meetings as they wish "except in matters affecting other groups or A.A. as a whole.”[3] Different
cultures affect ritual aspects of meetings, but around the world "many particularities of the AA meeting format can
be observed at almost any A.A. gathering.”[45]
Confidentiality:
Although a statement is sometimes read during meetings saying that what is said there should remain confidential,
AA members, unlike lawyers or clergy, are not legally bound to maintain confidentiality.[46][47]
Disease concept of alcoholism:

More informally than not, AA's membership has helped popularize the disease concept of alcoholism. Although AA
officially has had no part in the development of such postulates, these appeared as early as the late eighteenth
century.[48] Though AA initially avoided the term "disease," in 1973 conference-approved literature categorically
stated that "we had the disease of alcoholism."[49] Regardless of official positions, from AA's inception most
members have believed alcoholism to be a disease.[10]
While cautious in regarding the medical nature of alcoholism, AA has let others voice opinions. The Big Book states
"we are told that alcoholism is an illness which only a spiritual experience will conquer." Ernest Kurtz says this is
the “closest the book Alcoholics Anonymous comes to a definition of alcoholism."[10] In his introduction to The
Big Book, non-member Dr. William Silkworth suggested that those unable to moderate their drinking have an
allergy. However, AA said, "The doctor’s theory that we have an allergy to alcohol interests us. As laymen, our
opinion as to its soundness may, of course, mean little." [9] In fact AA later acknowledged that "alcoholism is not a
true allergy, the experts now inform us."[50] Wilson explained in 1960 that AA had avoided using the term disease,
"We A.A.'s have never called alcoholism a disease because, technically speaking, it is not a
disease entity. For example, there is no such thing as heart disease. Instead there are many separate
heart ailments or combinations of them. It is something like that with alcoholism. Therefore, we
did not wish to get in wrong with the medical profession by pronouncing alcoholism a disease
entity. Hence, we have always called it an illness or a malady — a far safer term for us to
use."[51]
Canadian and United States demographics:

AA's New York General Service Office regularly surveys AA members in North America. Its 2004 survey of over
7,500 members in Canada and the United States concluded that, in North America, AA members who responded to
the survey were 65% male and 35% female. Average member sobriety is eight years with 36% sober more than ten
years, 14% sober from five to ten years, 24% sober from one to five years, and 26% sober less than one year. Before
coming to AA, 64% of members received some type of treatment or counseling, such as medical, psychological, or
spiritual. After coming to AA, 65% received outside treatment or counseling, and 84% of those members said that
that outside help played an important part in their recovery. The same survey showed that AA received 11% of its
membership from court ordered attendance.[52]
Effectiveness of Alcoholics Anonymous:

AA tends to polarize observers into believers and non-believers,[53] and discussion of AA often creates controversy
rather than objective reflection.[54] Moreover, a randomized study of AA is difficult: AA members are not
randomly selected from the population of chronic alcoholics. The possible exception are those who are mandated by
courts to attend AA meetings. Either way, both groups are instead “self-selected.”[55] There are two opposing types
of self-selection bias: (1) drinkers may be motivated to stop drinking before they participate in AA, and (2) AA may
attract the more severe and difficult cases.[56] Controlled experiments with AA versus non-AA subjects are also
difficult because AA is so easily accessible. Twelve-step groups, like AA, are not conducive to probability sampling
of members. Research on AA is therefore susceptible to sampling bias.[57]
Studies:
Studies of AA's efficacy have produced inconsistent results. While some studies have suggested an association
between AA attendance and increased abstinence or other positive outcomes,[58][59][60][61][62][63] other studies
have not.[64][65][66][67][68] It should be noted, however, that the book Alcoholics Anonymous does not suggest
meeting attendance as a program of recovery, but instead suggests the Twelve Steps. A “Cochrane Review” [highly
statistically oriented analysis] of eight studies published between 1967 and 2005 measuring the effectiveness of AA,
found "no experimental studies unequivocally demonstrated the effectiveness of AA" in treating alcoholism, based
on the meta-analysis of the results of said eight trials involving a total of 3,417 individuals. To determine further the
effectiveness of AA, the authors suggested that more studies comparing treatment outcomes with control groups
were necessary.[69]
Survey results:
Every third year since 1968, AA has issued a pamphlet summarizing its latest triennial survey of meeting attendants.
Additional published comments and analysis for academics and professionals have supplemented the survey results
from 1970 through 1990.[13] The 1990 commentary evaluated data of triennial surveys from 1977 through 1989 and
found that one quarter (26%) of those who first attend an AA meeting are still attending after one year. Furthermore,
nearly one third (31.5%) leave the program after one month, and by the end of the third month, over half (52.6%)
leave.[70] After the first year, the rate of attrition slows. Only those in the first year were recorded by month.[70]
About 40% of the members sober for less than a year will remain another year. About 80% of those sober less than
five years will remain sober and active in the fellowship another year. About 90% of the members sober five years
or more will remain sober and active in the fellowship another year. Those who remained sober outside the
fellowship could not be calculated using the survey results.[70]
Loran Archer's analysis of AA's triennial membership surveys conducted from 1977 through 1989. [71] deduces
that:
The 95% dropout rate, claimed by some of A.A.'s modern critics,[72][73][74] is inaccurate and
based on flawed statistics. Rather than 5% of A.A. members remaining at the end of one year a
more accurate estimate is that 36% remain attending A.A. at the end of one year and 32% are still
attending at the end of 20 years.
Archer also faulted AA for under-counting its membership:[71]
The limitations of the A.A. membership surveys are well described in the GSO internal memo on
page 4. A major limitation is the significant under counting of the A.A. membership resulting
from the many groups that were not surveyed. The most recent "A.A. Fact File" that I received
from GSO shows the estimated A. A. membership in the U.S. as 1,168,990 members. This is a
significant undercount of members. Using a national representative survey of the U.S., in the
NIAAA 1991-1992 National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey (NLAES), I found that
in 1991-1992, 2.4 million individuals reported attending an A.A. meeting during the last year.
Survey results from National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey:

In 1992 United States Census Bureau and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)
conducted the National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey (NLAES). Direct face- to-face interviews were
conducted with one randomly selected respondent, 18 years of age or older, in each of 42,862 households within the
contiguous United States and the District of Columbia. NLAES respondents were asked whether they ever attended
an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting for any reason related to their drinking. 867 respondents stated they had attended
an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting for their drinking prior-to-the past year. 299 respondents stated they continued to
attend Alcoholics Anonymous during the past year, a 34% continuance rate.
In an analysis of the NLAES respondents the following socio-demographic variables were positively associated with
continuance in Alcoholics Anonymous:
• high severity of diagnostic symptoms,

• female gender
• divorced
• higher education level, some college or higher
• early age, 14 years and younger, of first drinking
• prior-to-past year stimulant, heroin, and methadone use
• mental health, health, school/job, and family problems
• personal and vehicle accidents
• urban population
• north-east and west geographic regions
Health-care costs:
As a volunteer-supported program, AA is free of charge. This contrasts with treatments for alcoholism such as
inpatient treatment, drug therapy, psychotherapy and cognitive-based therapy. Research has found that institutional
use of AA in certain circumstances has reduced health-care expenditures by 45%.[61]
Relationship with Prisons:

In the United States and Canada AA meetings are held in hundreds of correctional facilities. The AA General
Service Office has published a workbook with detailed recommendations for methods of approaching correctional
facility officials with the intent of developing an in-prison AA program.[75] In addition, AA publishes a variety of
pamphlets specifically for the incarcerated alcoholic.[76] Additionally, the AA General Service Office provides a
pamphlet with guidelines for members working with incarcerated alcoholics.[77]
United States Court rulings:

United States courts have ruled that inmates, parolees, and probationers cannot be ordered to attend AA. Though AA
itself was not deemed a religion, it was ruled that it contained enough religious components to make coerced
attendance at AA meetings a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the constitution.[78]
In September 2007, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit stated that a parole office can be sued for
ordering a parolee to attend AA.[79][80]
American treatment industry:

Although Alcoholics Anonymous does not endorse and is not allied with any outside facility, since 1949 when
Hazelden treatment center was founded by some AA members, alcoholic rehabilitation clinics have frequently
incorporated precepts of the AA program into their own treatment programs.[81] A reverse influence has also
occurred, as AA receives 31% of its membership from treatment center referrals.[52]
United Kingdom treatment industry:
A cross-sectional survey of substance-misuse treatment providers in the West Midlands found fewer than ten-
percent integrated twelve-step methods in their practice and only a third felt their consumers were suited for
Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous membership. Less than half were likely to recommend self-help
groups to their clients. Providers with nursing qualification were more likely to make such referrals than those
without. A statistically significant correlation was found between providers' self-reported level of spirituality and
their likelihood of recommending AA or NA.[82]
Criticism:
Stanton Peele argued that some AA groups apply the disease model to all problem drinkers, whether or not they are
"full-blown" alcoholics.[83] Along with Nancy Shute, Peele has advocated that besides AA, other options should be
available to problem drinkers who can manage their drinking with the right treatment.[84] The Big Book, however,
acknowledges "moderate drinkers" and "a certain type of hard drinker" able to stop or moderate their drinking. The
Big Book suggests no program for these drinkers, but instead seeks to help drinkers without "power of choice in
drink."[85]
Cultural identity:
One review of AA warned of detrimental iatrogenic effects of twelve-step philosophy and concluded that AA uses
many methods that are also used by cults.[86] A subsequent study concluded, however, that AA's program bore little
semblance to religious cults because the techniques used appeared beneficial.[87] Another difference is that, unlike
what happens in cults, AA does not seek to prevent a member leaving or renouncing the movement. Another study
found that the AA program's focus on admission of having a problem increases deviant stigma and strips members
of their previous cultural identity, replacing it with the deviant identity.[88] A survey of group members, however,
found they had a bicultural identity and saw AA's program as a complement to their other national, ethnic, and
religious cultures.[89]
Other criticisms:
* "Thirteenth-stepping" is a disparaging euphemism referring to AA members who approach new

members for dates or sex. The Journal of Addiction Nursing reported that 50% of the women that
participated in a survey (55 in all) experienced 13-stepping behavior from others.[90] To avoid
this type of behavior, AA suggests that typically men be sponsored by men and women be
sponsored by women.[91]
* Arthur H. Cain in 1963 said that AA members rely too heavily on dogmatic slogans and become
overly dependent on the group. He also said AA "has turned into a religious movement — and a
hindrance to research, psychiatry, and to many alcoholics who need a different kind of help."[92]
Literature:
Alcoholics Anonymous publishes several books, reports, pamphlets and other media, including a periodical known
as the AA Grapevine.[93] Two books are used primarily: Alcoholics Anonymous (the "Big Book") and Twelve
Steps and Twelve Traditions, the latter explaining AA's fundamental principles in depth.
* Alcoholics Anonymous (June 1, 1976). Alcoholics Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous World Services. ISBN
0916856593. OCLC 2353981. http://www.aa.org/bigbookonline/.
* Alcoholics Anonymous (February 10, 2002). Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. Alcoholics Anonymous
World Services. ISBN 0916856011. OCLC 13572433.
* The A.A. Grapevine (Alcoholics Anonymous). ISSN 0362-2584. OCLC 50379271.
http://www.aagrapevine.org/index.php.
AA in film
* “My Name Is Bill W.” -- dramatized biography of co-founder Bill Wilson
* “When a Man Loves a Woman” -- an airline pilot's wife attends AA meetings in a residential treatment facility
* “Clean and Sober” -- a cocaine addict visits an AA meeting to get a sponsor
* “The Answer Man” -- AA meeting at 0:59 ("burning desire", "newcomer")
* “When Love Is Not Enough: The Lois Wilson Story” – (2010) film about the wife of founder Bill Wilson, and
the beginnings of Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon.
* “Days of Wine and Roses” -- a 1962 film about a married couple struggling with alcoholism.
* “Drunks” -- a 1995 film starring Richard Lewis as an alcoholic who leaves an AA meeting and relapses.
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A Synopsis of AA

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History of Alcoholics Anonymous

Alcoholism in the 1930’s:

The Oxford Group:

1934 Bill Wilson sober:

1935 Dr. Bob sober:

An Akron group and a New York group:

1939 The Big Book:

1. We admitted that we were “licked,” that we were powerless over alcohol.

Into the 21st century:

Marriage, work, and addiction:

A spiritual program for recovery:

The final years:

Temptation and reports of infidelity:

Alternative cures and spiritualism:

Ancestry of "Dr. Bob S."

Controversy with the Church of England and the Vatican:

The Four Absolutes:

Five C's and Five Procedures:

Carl Jung on the Oxford Group:

Moral Re-Armament -- Pre-war

Oxford Group investigated by MI5 British Intelligence:

Oxford Group's position on labor and industry:

After the death of Buchman -- Peter Howard:

Oxford Group -- Alcoholism and Alcoholics Anonymous:

Oxford Group Recruitment Practices:

The use of slogans:

* Pray: stands for Powerful Radiograms Always Yours

Oxford Group literature:

Published literature critical of the Oxford Group:

Decline of the Oxford Group:

 Frank N.D. Buchman at "An Illustrated Alcoholics Anonymous Bibliography"

Beginnings -- History of Alcoholics Anonymous:

Organization and finances:

Disease concept of alcoholism:

Canadian and United States demographics:

Effectiveness of Alcoholics Anonymous:

Survey results from National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey:

• high severity of diagnostic symptoms,

Relationship with Prisons:

United States Court rulings:

American treatment industry:

* "Thirteenth-stepping" is a disparaging euphemism referring to AA members who approach new

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