One Drunk to Another Captain of My Soul
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Illustration · An imagined June afternoon on the lawn at Stepping Stones, after the Al-Anon picnic: chairs set out in a circle for the meeting that followed lunch, blankets on the grass, and the brown-shingled, hip-roofed house beyond. Drawn from Lois W.’s descriptions, not from a photograph.

Captain of My Soul

Meet Lois

A doctor’s daughter who spent seventeen years trying to love her husband sober, found she needed the program too, and helped start a fellowship for families like hers.

“…my wife Lois, the one who held steadfast when hope had gone, who had attended my second birth…”

Bill W., remembering her on the stage at AA’s convention in St. Louis, 1955 · Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age, 1957

Lois W. was born in 1891, the eldest child of a Brooklyn doctor who could never admit he was wrong, and she grew up every bit as sure of herself. In 1918 she married Bill W., a tall young man from Vermont, confident that her love would be enough to keep him from drinking. For seventeen years she tried.

When he stopped, in December 1934, someone else had done what she couldn’t. She opened their house to drunks, paid the bills, and felt shut out, until one Sunday she threw a shoe at him and saw that she needed the program too. She had once told herself she was “the captain of my soul.” Afterward, she wrote, God “had been promoted to captain and I demoted to His lieutenant.”

After two years with no home of their own, she and Bill found a house on a hill at Bedford Hills, New York, and named it Stepping Stones. There, in 1951, she and her friend Anne B. opened an office for the family groups that had grown up around AA, and the groups chose a name, Al-Anon. Alateen followed, for their children. She lived until 1988.

This is her story in seven parts and Legacy. It’s built mostly from her own memoir, Lois Remembers (1979), with Pass It On, AA’s biography of Bill (1984), and Bill’s AA Comes of Age (1957); where they disagree, these pages say so. Like the rest of this site, it’s an independent history, not produced or endorsed by Al-Anon Family Groups, any more than by AA.

Start with 1 · A doctor’s daughter

Her life at a glance

  1. 1891Born in Brooklyn, the first of six children of Dr. Clark Burnham.
  2. 1913Meets Bill W. at Emerald Lake, Vermont, where her family spends its summers.
  3. 1918Marries Bill on January 24, in Brooklyn.
  4. 1923The last of three ectopic pregnancies. They will have no children of their own.
  5. 1925Sets off with Bill for a year on the road, on a motorcycle with a sidecar.
  6. 1930Her mother dies on Christmas Day.
  7. 1931After two courses in interior decorating, goes to work at Macy’s.
  8. 1934Bill has his last drink in December, at Towns Hospital.
  9. 1939Leaves 182 Clinton Street in April. For two years they have no home of their own.
  10. 1941Moves into the house at Bedford Hills, New York, that they will name Stepping Stones.
  11. 1951With Anne B., opens an office for the family groups. Early the next year the groups choose the name Al-Anon.
  12. 1954Has a heart attack in January, and rests for a year.
  13. 1957The first Alateen group registers with Al-Anon’s office.
  14. 1971Bill is flown to Miami on January 24, their 53rd wedding anniversary, and dies that night.
  15. 1979Publishes Lois Remembers, and sets up the Stepping Stones Foundation.
  16. 1988Dies October 5, at 97.

Walk through her story

Each part has a short story, a one-minute audio stop, and a closer look for anyone who wants to go deeper. Read them in order, or start anywhere.

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