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Historical Data

AA had its beginnings in 1935 at Akron, Ohio, as the outcome of a meeting between Bill W., a New York stockbroker, and Dr. Bob S., an Akron surgeon. Both had been hopeless alcoholics.

AA had its beginnings in 1935 at Akron, Ohio, as the outcome of a meeting between Bill W., a New York stockbroker, and Dr. Bob S., an Akron surgeon. Both had been hopeless alcoholics.

Prior to that time, Bill and Dr. Bob had each been in contact with the Oxford Group, a mostly non-alcoholic fellowship that emphasized universal spiritual values in daily living. In that period, the Oxford Groups in America were headed by the noted Episcopal clergyman, Dr. Samuel Shoemaker. Under this spiritual influence, and with the help of an old-time friend, Ebby T., Bill had gotten sober and had then maintained his recovery by working with other alcoholics, though none of these had actually recovered. Meanwhile, Dr. Bob's Oxford Group membership at Akron had not helped him enough to achieve sobriety.

When Dr. Bob and Bill finally met, the effect on the doctor was immediate. This time, he found himself face to face with a fellow sufferer who had made good. Bill emphasized that alcoholism was a malady of mind, emotions and body. This all-important fact he had learned from Dr. William D. Silkworth of Towns Hospital in New York, where Bill had often been a patient. Though a physician, Dr. Bob had not known alcoholism to be a disease. Responding to Bill's convincing ideas, he soon got sober, never to drink again. The founding spark of Alcoholics Anonymous had been struck.

Both men immediately set to work with alcoholics at Akron's City Hospital, where one patient quickly achieved complete sobriety. Though the name Alcoholics Anonymous had not yet been coined, these three men actually made up the nucleus of the first AA group. In the fall of 1935, a second group of alcoholics slowly took shape in New York. A third appeared at Cleveland in 1939. It had taken over four years to produce 100 sober alcoholics in the three founding groups.

Early in 1939, the Fellowship published its basic textbook, Alcoholics Anonymous. The text, written by Bill, explained AA's philosophy and methods, the core of which was the now well-known Twelve Steps of recovery. The book was also reinforced by case histories of some thirty recovered members. From this point, AA's development was rapid.

Also in 1939, the Cleveland Plain Dealer carried a series of articles about AA, supported by warm editorials. The Cleveland group of only twenty members was deluged by countless pleas for help. Alcoholics sober only a few weeks were set to work on brand-new cases. This was a new departure, and the results were fantastic. A few months later, Cleveland's membership had expanded to 500. For the first time, it was shown that sobriety could be mass-produced.

Meanwhile, in New York, Dr. Bob and Bill had in 1938 organized an over-all trusteeship for the budding Fellowship. Friends of John D. Rockefeller Jr. became board members alongside a contingent of AAs. This board was named The Alcoholic Foundation. However, all efforts to raise large amounts of money failed, because Mr. Rockefeller had wisely concluded that great sums might spoil the infant society. Nevertheless, the foundation managed to open a tiny office in New York to handle inquiries and to distribute the Alcoholics Anonymous. book - an enterprise which, by the way, had been mostly financed by the AAs themselves.

The book and the new office were quickly put to use. An article about AA was carried by Liberty magazine in the fall of 1939, resulting in some 800 urgent calls for help. In 1940, Mr. Rockefeller gave a dinner for many of his prominent New York friends to publicize AA This brought yet another flood of pleas. Each inquiry received a personal letter and a small pamphlet. Attention was also drawn to the book Alcoholics Anonymous, which soon moved into brisk circulation. Aided by mail from New York, and by AA travellers from already-established centres, many new groups came alive. At the year's end, the membership stood at 2,000.

Then, in March 1941, the Saturday Evening Post featured an excellent article about AA, and the response was enormous. By the close of that year, the membership had jumped to 6,000, and the number of groups multiplied in proportion. Spreading across the U.S. and Canada, the Fellowship mushroomed.

By 1950, 100,000 recovered alcoholics could be found worldwide. Spectacular though this was, the period 1940-1950 was nonetheless one of great uncertainty. The crucial question was whether all those mercurial alcoholics could live and work together in groups. Could they hold together and function effectively? This was the unsolved problem. Corresponding with thousands of groups about their problems became a chief occupation of the New York headquarters.

By 1946, however, it had already become possible to draw sound conclusions about the kinds of attitude, practice and function that would best suit AA's purpose. Those principles, which had emerged from strenuous group experience, were codified by Bill in what are today the Twelve Traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous. By 1950, the earlier chaos had largely disappeared. A successful formula for AA unity and functioning had been achieved and put into practice. (See The Structure of AA General Service in U.S./Canada.)

During this hectic ten-year period, Dr. Bob devoted himself to the question of hospital care for alcoholics, and to their indoctrination with AA principles. Large numbers of alcoholics flocked to Akron to receive hospital care at St. Thomas, a Catholic hospital. Dr. Bob became a member of its staff. Subsequently, he and the remarkable Sister M. Ignatia, also of the staff, cared for and brought AA to some 5,000 sufferers. After Dr. Bob's death in 1950, Sister Ignatia continued to work at Cleveland's Charity Hospital, where she was assisted by the local groups and where 10,000 more sufferers first found AA. This set a fine example of hospitalization wherein AA could cooperate with both medicine and religion.

In this same year of 1950, AA held its first International Convention at Cleveland. There, Dr. Bob made his last appearance and keyed his final talk to the need of keeping AA simple. Together with all present, he saw the Twelve Traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous enthusiastically adopted for the permanent use of the AA Fellowship throughout the world. (He died on November 16, 1950.)

The following year witnessed still another significant event. The New York office had greatly expanded its activities, and these now consisted of public relations, advice to new groups, services to hospitals, prisons, Loners, and Internationalists, and cooperation with other agencies in the alcoholism field. The headquarters was also publishing "standard" AA books and pamphlets, and it supervised their translation into other tongues. Our international magazine, the AA Grapevine, had achieved a large circulation. These and many other activities had become indispensable for AA as a whole.

Nevertheless, these vital services were still in the hands of an isolated board of trustees, whose only link to the Fellowship had been Bill and Dr. Bob. As the co-founders had foreseen years earlier, it became absolutely necessary to link AA's world trusteeship (now the General Service Board of Alcoholics Anonymous) with the Fellowship that it served. Delegates from all states and provinces of the U.S. and Canada were forthwith called in. Thus composed, this body for world service first met in 1951. Despite earlier misgivings, the gathering was a great success. For the first time, the remote trusteeship became directly accountable to AA as a whole. The AA General Service Conference had been created, and AA's over-all functioning was thereby assured for the future.

A second International Convention was held in St. Louis in 1955 to celebrate the Fellowship's 20th anniversary. The General Service Conference had by then completely proved its worth. Here, on behalf of AA's old-timers, Bill turned the future care and custody of AA over to the Conference and its trustees. At this moment, the Fellowship went on its own; AA had come of age.

Had it not been for AA's early friends, Alcoholics Anonymous might never have come into being. And without its host of well-wishers who have since given of their time and effort - particularly those friends of medicine, religion, and world communications - AA could never have grown and prospered. The Fellowship here records its constant gratitude.

It was on January 24, 1971, that Bill, a victim of pneumonia, died in Miami Beach, Florida, where - seven months earlier - he had delivered at the 35th Anniversary International Convention what proved to be his last words to fellow AAs: "God bless you and Alcoholics Anonymous forever."

Since then, AA has become truly global, and this has revealed that AA's way of life can today transcend most barriers of race, creed and language. A World Service Meeting, started in 1969, has been held biennially since 1972. Its locations alternate between New York and overseas. It has met in London, England; Helsinki, Finland; San Juan del Rio, Mexico; Guatemala City, Guatemala; Munich, Germany and Cartagena, Colombia.

The start of AA in Great Britain

The venue for AA's first meeting in Great Britain was pretty classy - London's Dorchester Hotel. Grace O, an American AA, visiting London had been asked by GSO in New York to contact several people in Britain who wanted information about AA. Amongst them were Chris B, probably the first person in England to use AA to attain sobriety, 'Canadian' Bob B, an American serviceman Sergeant Vernon W, and Norman R-W, who was still drinking. The meeting was held in Room 202 of the hotel at 8 p.m. on Monday 31st March 1947. Others attending the meeting were Tony F, an Irish airman, Flash W, an American and Pat G, a female member from California whom Grace had met on the voyage.

In the same way that early American meetings had been held in members' homes meetings were held in Canadian Bob's house in Mortlake Road, Kew Gardens as well as in cafés.

Progress was slow at first but when Canadian Bob visited new members Alan and wife Winnie in Bolton he informed them that they were the Bolton Group. In November 1948 the Group held its first meeting in the Millgate Hotel, Manchester.

When Canadian Bob introduced Bill H to sobriety in AA our service structure expanded with Bill's office in the London Fruit Exchange providing the fellowship with a postal address (BM/AAL London WC1) and a contact number (Bishopgate 9657) available Monday to Friday.

By January 1949 meetings in London were being held on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11 Chandos Street and membership had passed the magic 100.

In 1952 AA began to lease 11 Redcliffe Gardens with the Central Committee managing it as the Central Service Office. In 1970 it became the General Service Office under the management of the General Service Board. When GSO relocated to Stonebow House in York in 1986 the London Regional Telephone office remained at Redcliffe Gardens until January 1999 when it moved into the Regional Service Office (London) at Jacob House and Redcliffe Gardens passed out of AA history.

Meanwhile in Scotland the Oxford Groups had an instrumental role in AA beginnings as they had in America. The wife of Philip D, an active alcoholic, attended an Oxford Group in Scotland and heard about the Groups' role in the start of AA. Philip visited America in 1948 and attended meetings before returning to Scotland and carrying the message. Forbes C got involved and meetings began in Perth, Edinburgh and Glasgow in 1949.

Cathedral Road, Cardiff was the location of the first AA meeting in Wales. The meeting took place on Friday 13th April 1951 with five attendees.

(Information collated from AA archives with particular reliance on Share Magazine: Alcoholics Anonymous in Great Britain The first fifty years 1947 to 1997: March 1997)