New York, Cleveland and Houston · 1939–1940
Two outsiders told AA’s story in the fall of 1939. Then a member off the train in Houston told it himself, and signed nothing.
“all in one piece again.”
AA’s first stories in print came from outsiders. In 1939 a free-lance writer, Morris Markey, heard about AA from Charlie Towns, at whose hospital Bill W. had once been a regular, and carried it to Fulton Oursler, the editor of Liberty. “Morris, you’ve got an assignment,” Oursler said, as Bill remembered it. “Alcoholics and God” ran that September. A month later Cleveland’s Plain Dealer put a feature writer, Elrick B. Davis, on the story. (Twelve postcards and You had to be sponsored tell what came of them.)
Larry J. was a newspaperman too, from Cleveland, and drink had nearly killed him. He had barely escaped death by d.t.’s and exhaustion, Bill wrote, and a lung ailment kept him in an oxygen tent much of the time. AA members had pulled him off Cleveland’s skid row, Arthur S.’s timeline says, though he had never been to a meeting. Early in 1940 he set out by train for Houston to live and work, with the Big Book to read on the way.
On the train, reading it, he had what Bill called a spiritual awakening. In Houston he wrote six articles for the Houston Press, a condensation of the Big Book, Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers says, and by Lois W.’s chronology he wrote them anonymously.
The articles drew the attention of the townsmen and their bishop, Bill wrote, “and thus finally, after heartbreaking setbacks, the first group in Texas emerged.” Roy Y., who got in touch after reading them, was the first Texan to get sober and stay sober, Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers says, and by Arthur S.’s timeline the first meeting in Texas met at the YMCA on March 15, 1940. Larry’s first prospects carried it farther: Ed, a salesman, to Austin; Roy, in the Army, to Tampa; and Esther to Dallas, where she started AA.
It’s early 1940, on a train out of Cleveland, bound for Houston. Larry J. is a newspaperman. Not long ago, drink nearly killed him, and a bad lung keeps him in an oxygen tent much of the time. He has never been to an AA meeting, but he has the Big Book, and somewhere along the way, reading it, something changes. He feels all in one piece again.
In Houston he sits down and writes six articles for the Houston Press, the Big Book boiled down for newspaper readers. His name isn’t on them. A man named Roy reads them, gets in touch, and gets sober. In March, the first AA meeting in Texas meets at the YMCA.
Two outsiders had told AA’s story the fall before. This time one of its own members told it, and signed nothing.
In print
AA’s first three stories in the press: who wrote them, how they came about, and what came back.
From Bill W.’s accounts in the Grapevine (1957) and AA Comes of Age (1957), Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers (1980), and Lois W.’s memoir (1979).
September 1939
“Alcoholics and God,” by Morris Markey, a free-lance writer whom Charlie Towns had sold on AA. Markey sold it to the editor, Fulton Oursler, who gave him the assignment on the spot.
About 800 letters
Twelve postcards, in By the CarloadBill W., 1957
October 1939
A series in Cleveland by a feature writer, Elrick B. Davis, that ran for about ten days beside editorials that said, in effect, “AA is good and it works. Come and get it.” Clarence S. said he had talked him into it.
Hundreds of calls
You had to be sponsoredBill W., 1957; Good Oldtimers, 1980
Early 1940
Six articles by Larry J., a member, boiling the Big Book down for newspaper readers. He wrote them anonymously.
AA in Texas
Good Oldtimers, 1980; Lois W., 1979
Who wrote them
The first two were outsiders’ assignments. The third was a member’s, and he wrote it anonymously.
For a closer look
How a Cleveland reporter got into a meeting, who was Texas’s first woman member, and what became of Larry J.
“Somehow—accounts vary,” Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers says, Clarence S. came across a Plain Dealer reporter and persuaded him to write the series.
Warren C. remembered that Clarence “sneaked a Plain Dealer reporter into one of the meetings.” Clarence told it otherwise: someone else had brought Davis to the meetings, and “I convinced him to write a series on A.A. and told him he might catch fire if he did a good job.” The book leaves the two accounts side by side.
Lois W. met him on November 16, 1939, at the second of two Cleveland meetings she and Bill went to that night, and wrote in her diary that she had met “Elrick Davis, who wrote Plain Dealer articles.”
Bill counted Esther among Larry J.’s first good prospects. She moved to Dallas, started AA there, and became, he wrote, “dean of all the alky ladies in the astonishing state of Texas.”
Arthur S.’s timeline names another woman as the first in Texas: Benita C., whom the Houston Press articles also brought in, and who later married Larry. The two needn’t conflict. Bill’s line is about who started a group and led the women who came after; Arthur S.’s is about who came first.
Bill’s history leaves Larry J. carrying the message in Texas. Lois W. counted him among the members who carried it to a great number of alcoholics: he “did much for A.A. in Texas through his articles in the Houston Press.”
Arthur S.’s timeline, citing letters in AA’s archives, adds that he later drank again, and that it led to his death in 1944.