Teachers of the A.A. Old timers, page 246:
John D. ("J. D.") Holmes, the tenth person to
get sober in A.A., left Akron in 1938 and moved
to Evansville, Indiana, where he eventually was
able to start the first A.A. meeting in Indiana.
"Although Rhoda was not an alcoholic, she and
J. D. held something like an A.A. meeting every
Wednesday night in their home in order to help
him keep sober .... Like so many A.A.'s from the
very early period, J. D. and Rhoda used an
extremely popular devotional manual called The
Upper Room for their private daily meditation
and also to provide a discussion topic for this
little Wednesday meeting."
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++++Message 3927. . . . . . . . . . . . The Forgotten Steps (6 and 7)
From: doci333 . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/8/2006 1:45:00 PM
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Good Day AA History Lovers,
A while back I read Message #2499, regarding
wanted information on The Forgotten Steps.
I had read a pamphlet, which was printed and
copyrighted by Hazelden in 1981, titled, "The
Forgotten Steps" but couldn't put my finger on
it at the time.
The pamphlet is 14 pages long and deals with
the struggles of "working" The Program and
finding character defects that just haven't gone
away, and suggests looking a Steps 6 and 7 from
an entirely different angle.
An excerpt: "I've tried so many ways to get rid
of them, and they're still there. Something's
not working. What am I doing wrong?" There seems
to be a persistent feeling of uneasiness in spite
of sincere efforts to work the program."
"This pamphlet is written in the hope of helping
people overcome the obstacles they face in working
these Steps."
The pamphlet mentions that even with honest efforts
in Steps 4 and 5, individuals still are not finding
the peace of mind that indicates serenity. "Doubt
creeps in, and the recovering person begins to
feel inadequate and discouraged about the program
of recovery suggested by Alcoholics Anonymous."
The pamphlet goes on to point out that:
"One of the potentially frightening aspects of
working Steps Six and Seven is that they require
us to deal directly with God. We are left alone
to communicate directly with our God; to look at
our relationship with Him in the privacy and
loneliness of our own hearts and minds. Very
frequently, this problem arises not because we do
not want to work these Steps, but because we
don't know how."*
*"Opinions expressed are solely those of the
author of the pamphlet."
Another frightening aspect, in a "nut-shell":
"Are we so ashamed of our acts that we cannot
bear to look at them ourselves, much less share
them with such a powerful being? One must wonder
if these feelings aren't present when we pray
like this:
'Dear God, I want to be more honest.'
'Dear God, I want to have more patience.'
'Dear God, I want to be a kinder person.'
We are praying for what we want to be, or how we
think we should be, instead of simply and honestly
telling Him how it really is with us. Wouldn't
it make sense, when we come to God with our
defects of character, to make a statement of what
our condition is rather than what we want it
to be?
Steps 6 and 7 really don't mention, 'gimme,' 'gimme,'
as I so often gave God my shopping list. Steps 6
and 7 do mention, 'remove.' I know now that I was
still controlling and manipulating my environment.
For the healing of my Alcoholism, began when I
admitted that I was powerless over alcohol and
not when I continually asked, "make me a normal
drinker."
Some further excerpts:
"Coming back to Steps Six and Seven, perhaps we
need to remember the problems we encountered with
Step One. Maybe we need to begin our prayers
with an honest statement of how it is!
'Dear God, I am impatient.'
'Dear God, I am an intolerant person.'
'Dear God, I do lack faith.'
'Dear God, I am an unkind person.'
Present Him with the reality of ourselves,
instead of our dreams and wishes of how we want
to be."
Further excerpts:
"Maybe this is an area in which we could make use
of the willpower that was so useless to us in our
attempts to stop drinking on our own. Will is simply
the power to choose. We have the power to choose
to do whatever we need to do to nourish our faith,
no matter how tenuous it may be. We can choose to
go to meetings. We can choose to read the daily
readings. We can choose to attempt to live the
Twelve Steps honestly. We can choose to go to any
length in pursuit of sobriety. We can choose to
pray unselfishly.
So it is with our character defects. We can choose
to identify them, to become aware of them and
accept them and, as a result, gain some measure
of strength to manage them, instead of being managed
by them. We can choose to share them honestly with
our Higher Power, to tell it like it is and to ask
His help in their removal, believing that He will
remove them."
Just passing it on,
David G.
Illinois
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++++Message 3928. . . . . . . . . . . . The Upper Room and Travis Park
Church in San Antonio
From: James R . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/8/2006 1:39:00 AM
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I was interested to see the reference to the role
Travis Park Methodist Church of San Antonio played
in the origins of "The Upper Room." That church
provides meeting space for two AA groups. I've
attended many meetings there.
Jim C.
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++++Message 3929. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: "Victory" vs. "Transcendence"
From: Tom Hickcox . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/7/2006 7:51:00 PM
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I originally wrote:
The editors tell us some changes are made "in
the interest of clarity." They changed victory
in the 3rd Step Prayer to transcendence, but
that doesn't seem to me to add clarity.
Tommy
- - -
In the Big Book what has come to be known as the
Third Step Prayer is found on p. 63 and it has
a sentence that starts, "Take away my difficulties,
that victory over them . . ."
Page 210 of As Bill Sees It/The A.A. Way of Life,
quoting p. 63, has the same sentence but with
different wording, "Take away my difficulties,
that my transcendence over them . . ."
Victory is used in all four editions of the
Big Book and in the "Original Manuscript"[s]
I've seen.
So, my question is why the compilers and editors
of ABSI/AAWL saw fit to change the wording of
the Third Step Prayer?
Tommy H in Baton Rouge
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++++Message 3930. . . . . . . . . . . . Bleeding deacons or bleating
deacons?
From: Ernest Kurtz . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/7/2006 2:19:00 PM
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Once upon a time, there was a discussion whether
the original term for a certain type of frustrated
leadership was "bleeding deacons" or "bleating
deacons." Might anyone recall how that was settled,
if it was -- and, of course, the evidence adduced?
Thanks.
ernie kurtz
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++++Message 3931. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: Bleeding deacons or bleating
deacons?
From: James Blair . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/9/2006 12:19:00 AM
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Bleeding deacons or bleating deacons?
Once upon a time, there was a discussion whether
the original term for a certain type of frustrated
leadership was "bleeding deacons" or "bleating
deacons."
This term was used in a GV article and it was Bleating Deacon.
I can't remember the year.
Jim
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++++Message 3932. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: The Little Red Book 17th
printing
From: Tom Hickcox . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/8/2006 11:52:00 PM
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The title page of the 17th printing says 1963
- - -
At 16:32 12/8/2006 , john wikelkius wrote:
>Need date of the 17th printing of
>The Little Red Book.
- - -
The title page of the 17th printing says 1963
while the list of "to date" printings on the
copyright page says that the immediately previous
printing came out in 1962, which was also the
year the 16th printing was published.
Coll-Webb published the first printing in
1946 and two printings in 1947. There was
one printing a year thru the 24th in 1970
except for no printings in 1956 and 1958.
I would suspect the publishing date was 1963.
Tommy H in Baton Rouge
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++++Message 3933. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: The Little Red Book 17th
printing
From: dudleydobinson . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/9/2006 6:53:00 AM
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Hi,
I have a copy of the 17th printing and it lists
on the copyright page all printing dates from 1st
to the 17th which it states as being 1962.
However I think this is a mistake as the title
page gives 1963 and later printings give the
printing date as being 1963.
Hope this helps.
In fellowship,
Dudley
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++++Message 3934. . . . . . . . . . . . Little Red Books
From: DudleyDobinson . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/9/2006 5:15:00 PM
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Hi Tommy
I agree with your posting except that there was
a 25th printing in 1970.
I have a complete collection from 1st to 25th
with the exception of the 10th printing in 1954,
which I have been looking for since 2002. Can
anybody help?
In fellowship - Dudley
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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++++Message 3935. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: Bleeding deacons or bleating
deacons?
From: Azor521@aol.com . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/9/2006 12:25:00 PM
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In a message dated 12/9/2006 jblair@videotron.ca
(jblair at videotron.ca) writes:
This term was used in a GV article and it was
Bleating Deacon. I can't remember the year.
- - -
AA Grapevine 1962 and 1963
"Bleating Deacons' Corner"
"Bleeder's Bleat"
AAGrapevine.org .... AA Grapevine Digital Archive
Azor
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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++++Message 3936. . . . . . . . . . . . The different printings of The
Little Red Book
From: Glenn Chesnut . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/9/2006 5:38:00 PM
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In the case of The Little Red Book, determining
which printing you are using, and when it came
out, is more important for the AA historian than
with any other early AA book.
Edward A. Webster (sober October 10, 1942, died
1971) made what were sometimes fairly substantive
changes in The Little Red book during the early
years (see http://hindsfoot.org/ed02.html ),
from 1946 to 1949, which was the last edition
where we had Dr. Bob checking through the material
and making additions and corrections. (Dr. Bob
died on November 16, 1950.)
Ed Webster however continued to make changes at
times in the editions of The Little Red Book
which appeared subsequently, all the way down
to the end of his own life (he died in 1971,
the same year as Bill Wilson).
Ed's wife sold the copyright to Hazelden, where
they have unfortunately continued to make changes
all the way down to the present, most of them
made by some Hazelden editor who did not have
Ed's skill or intelligence or knowledge of the
program, but thought that he or she could change
the wording of a sentence slightly to make it
"read more smoothly."
It's frustrating, because it's a bit like some
of the Victorian editors who thought they could
improve Shakespeare's wording ("What did
Shakespeare know about writing good English,
or the proper way of constructing a play?"
they apparently thought to themselves).
It would be nice to have a volume containing
the text (exactly as the material was originally
printed) of the 1946 printing and the last of
the two 1949 printings, because of their
importance for early AA history.
Dr. Bob was not a skilled writer in the way
that Bill W. was, so The Little Red Book is the
closest we are going to get to understanding
the details of the way Dr. Bob taught the AA
program to newcomers. It nevertheless gives us
a clear enough picture of the way Dr. Bob thought,
to show the falsity of some of the recent claims,
made by various people, that they have reconstructed
"original Akron AA" on the basis of a few spotty
bits of anecdotal evidence and statements by
people like Frank Amos.
Because we have a few people today (some of whom
have written in to the AAHistoryLovers) arguing
that "meetings are not important, and I can PROVE
it from conference approved literature" [sic]
it is probably important to post a note on that
particular claim here.
Frank Amos was a good man, but he was not an
alcoholic, not a participating member of any
AA group, and was simply the representative of
John D. Rockefeller, Jr., making a quick report
in February 1938 based on a few days of
investigation, see Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers,
pp. 129-134.
Frank Amos' statement, for example, that "It is
important, BUT NOT VITAL, that he meet frequently
with other reformed alcoholics and form both a
social and religious comradeship," was blatantly
untrue.
This can be disproved from reading the rest of
Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, where it is clear
that the early Akron AA's usually dropped by Dr.
Bob and Anne's house at least once a day, either
for the morning meeting (where they read most
commonly from the Bible or The Upper Room, and
discussed what they had gotten from the reading
and from the prayerful period of Quiet Time which
followed) or by coming over to their house in
the evening, to engage in fellowship with other
recovering alcoholics.
No, boys and girls, the importance of meetings
(and other kinds of fellowship with other
recovering alcoholics, in the form of a telephone
call or an exchange of emails, if in no other way)
is one of the most important parts of the program.
The good old timers in my area of the country have
regularly observed that at least 90% to 95% of
the AA people who go back out and start drinking
again, FIRST stopped attending meetings. The
slide downhill often starts very slowly -- "it's
raining out, and I think I'll skip just this
one meeting" (never stopped any of us from going
out when we ran out of liquor in the house, did
it now?) -- "I'll cut back and go to one less
meeting a week, so I can watch TV" (or go bowling
or what have you) -- but gradually these people
on the downhill slide go to fewer and fewer
meetings, until they are not attending any
at all.
And some of them continue to stay off the booze
in spite of that. But again, at least 90% to
95% of the alcoholics who got sober in AA but
return to drinking, FIRST stopped going to
meetings.
Rich Dubiel's book on the Emmanuel Movement and
the Jacoby Club (the only other twentieth century
groups which had significant success in getting
alcoholics sober) makes clear by its title one
of the most important things which Rich observed:
it was fellowship among recovering alcoholics
(combined with a little bit of non-denominational
spirituality and a little bit of lay psychological
therapy) which enabled those two groups to be
successful.
Richard M. Dubiel, "The Road to Fellowship: The
Role of the Emmanuel Movement and the Jacoby
Club in the Development of Alcoholics Anonymous"
(2004) -- http://hindsfoot.org/kDub1.html
For those who want a "scientific theory" of why
fellowshiping with other alcoholics is so
important, in a book which will be coming out
in early 2007, a good sociologist, Annette R.
Smith, Ph.D., in "The Social World of Alcoholics
Anonymous: How It Works," is going to lay out the
details of the process through which newcomers
to AA heal their lives by slowly becoming more
and more involved in what she calls "the social
world" of AA.
Dr. Smith argues that looking only at the formal
organizational structure of AA does not tell us
nearly enough about where the healing is coming
from. The picnics and dances are just as important,
along with going out for pie and coffee before
or after the meeting, learning to know the other
members of the group at a deep personal level,
talking to people on the telephone, and building
up a strong support network of people whom we can
call on at any hour of the day or night, and who
will come to us instantly (without us even having
to ask them) whenever they hear that we are in
the hospital or have a family member dying or
have just lost our job or any of the other slings
and arrows which life can throw at us.
But to get back to the main point, reading early
AA literature like The Little Red Book (which
gets us closer to Dr. Bob's mind than anything
else we have) can help keep us from developing
hare-brained ideas and theories about early AA,
and keep us sensible and squarely on the beam.
A book containing the 1946 first edition of The
Little Red Book, together with the last of the
two 1949 editions (where under Dr. Bob's impetus
a good deal of additional excellent material had
been inserted in the book) could help the modern
AA fellowship enormously, in terms of giving us
some solid and guaranteed workable guidelines
for getting sober in AA, and continuing to grow
spiritually, so that our lives might continue
to grow ever more serene and filled with joy and
satisfaction.
Glenn C. (South Bend, Indiana)
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++++Message 3937. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: Use of "The Upper Room" in early
AA
From: Mitchell K. . . . . . . . . . . . . 12/9/2006 2:02:00 AM
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As you quote Dorothy S. M. as an "old-timer" please
note that Dorothy was Clarence's wife. It was Dorothy
Snyder, Ruth Hock, Bill Wilson and Hank Parkhurst who
visited Cornwall, NY (Orange County NY) to visit
Cornwall Press to review, finalize and approve the
finaly galleys of the Big Book First Edition First
Printing.
=======================================================
> I have collected some passages talking about the
> use of "The Upper Room" for morning prayer and
> meditation in early AA, which I give below.
>
> Ernie Kurtz is corresponding with the Upper Room
> headquarters in Nashville about making either
> a printed version or a searchable electronic
> version of the 1935-1938 issues available for
> AA historians.
>
> They were interested, but wanted some good solid
> documentation that this AA tradition (about
> early AA people reading The Upper Room) could
> be thoroughly corroborated
>
> Are there members of the group who could give us
> some other citations from written sources from
> the period between 1935 and 1948 of AA people
> using "The Upper Room"?
>
> (I am using 1948 as the cut-off date, because
> that is when AA member Richmond Walker published
> Twenty-Four Hours a Day.)
>
> Glenn C. (South Bend, Indiana)
>
> - - -
>
> From Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, the official
> A.A. biography of the cofounder of A.A., pages
> 71-72, 137-139. and 310-311:
>
> "Sue [Dr. Bob's daughter] remembered the quiet
> time in the mornings -- how they sat around reading
> the Bible. Later, they also used The Upper Room,
> a Methodist publication that provided a daily
> inspirational message, interdenominational in its
> approach. 'Then somebody said a prayer,' she
> recalled. 'After that, we were supposed to say one
> ourselves. Then we'd be quiet. Finally, everyone
> would share what they got, or didn't get. This
> lasted for at least a half hour and sometimes went
> as long as an hour."'
>
> "As T. Henry described it, a typical meeting in
> 1938-39 went like this .... 'Usually, the person
> who led the Wednesday meeting took something from
> The Upper Room [the Methodist periodical mentioned
> earlier] or some other literature as a subject.
> Sometimes, they selected a theme such as "My
> Utmost Effort" or "My Highest Goal." There would
> be a quiet time. then different people would
> tell something out of their own experience.'"
>
> An A.A. old timer named Dorothy S. M., talking
> about the way Dr. Bob worked with newcomers,
> mentioned that he would sometimes recommend that
> they read Drummond's The Greatest Thing in the
> World. "Those were the three main books at that
> time: that, The Upper Room, and [Emmet Fox's]
> Sermon on the Mount."
>
> A Manual for Alcoholics Anonymous (from AA Group
> No. 1, Akron, Ohio, 1940, Part VI):
>
> "Now you are out of the hospital .... First
> off, your day will have a new pattern. You will
> open the day with a quiet period. This will be
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