One Drunk to Another Suggestions Only
Watch The Kitchen Table
Illustration · A work table with small black books waiting to be wrapped and mailed, the letters that asked for them, and a bundle of handwritten cards. Drawn from Glenn C.’s account of Richmond W. mailing Twenty-Four Hours a Day from his basement; not drawn from a photograph.

Minneapolis and Daytona Beach · 1946–1954

Pocket cards

Two members wrote little books for other alcoholics and saw them into print themselves, and AA turned one of them down.

“Make book for morning quiet times — short passages for each day…”

Richmond W., in a note in his own copy of the Big Book · Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, 2024

Two little books

By the mid-1940s some members were writing their own books about the Steps. In Minneapolis, Ed W., sober since December 1941, had been teaching the Steps to beginners at the Nicollet Group. With his friend Barry C. he turned his notes into a book, An Interpretation of the Twelve Steps of the Alcoholics Anonymous Program, first printed in August 1946. The publisher’s name, Coll-Webb, was made from the two men’s names. “There was not really any commercial publishing firm called Coll-Webb,” the AA historian Glenn C. wrote in 2005. They paid the printer themselves.

Dr. Bob, later historians say, sent Ed comments on the early printings. By 1948 a note in the book called it “this little red book,” and in time the name went onto the title page: The Little Red Book.

Richmond W., a Boston businessman sober in AA since May 1942, belonged by then to the group in Daytona Beach, Florida. In his own copy of the Big Book he had written a plan, and a title: Twenty-Four Hours a Day. He started, by Glenn C.’s account, with readings written on small cards that he carried around for his own prayer and meditation. In 1948 the Daytona Beach members talked him into printing them. A member who sat on the county commission got him the use of the county’s printing press, and the little black book sold for $1.50, with a page for each day of the year.

A color postcard of a shopping street in Daytona Beach, with low storefronts, parked cars and palm trees.
Beach Street, Daytona Beach’s business district, on a postcard from about 1930 to 1945.Tichnor Brothers Collection, Boston Public Library

AA members wrote to him for copies, Glenn C. wrote, and he wrapped the books and mailed them from his basement. He kept his name off the book. Later printings said only that it was “Compiled by a member of the Group at Daytona Beach, Fla.” By 1953, Hazelden’s history says, orders were steady at 600 a month, more than he could keep up with, and he offered the book to AA’s office in New York to publish, income and all. AA said no. On June 1, 1954, Hazelden, a treatment center in Minnesota, took it on. It was Hazelden’s first book.

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Members’ books

Two little books

The red book from Minneapolis and the black one from Daytona Beach, question by question. Neither was AA’s, and both are still in print.

From Glenn C.’s histories, Hazelden’s own accounts and dealers’ descriptions of early copies. Where they disagree, Go deeper says so.

Who wrote it

The Little Red Book, 1946

Ed W., sober in Minneapolis since December 1941, with his friend Barry C. Dr. Bob sent comments on the early printings, later historians say.

Twenty-Four Hours a Day, 1948

“Compiled by a member of the Group at Daytona Beach, Fla.”

Richmond W., sober since May 1942. He kept his name off the book, and later printings carried only this line, Glenn C. reports.

Where it came from

The Little Red Book, 1946

“…a series of notes originally prepared for ‘12 Steps’ instruction to A.A. beginners…”

Notes for teaching the Steps to beginners, as a note in the 1948 printing puts it, in a dealer’s transcription. Glenn C. says they were Ed’s lessons at the Nicollet Group.

Twenty-Four Hours a Day, 1948

“…small cards which he carried around with him…”

Readings for his own prayer and meditation, Glenn C. wrote. Hazelden dates the writing to 1946 to 1948.

Who paid

The Little Red Book, 1946

“There was not really any commercial publishing firm called Coll-Webb.”

Ed and Barry paid the printer, with the Nicollet Group as sponsor, Glenn C. wrote in 2005.

Twenty-Four Hours a Day, 1948

“The county was paid for the printing…”

Glenn C. wrote, without saying who paid. Daytona Beach members talked Richmond into printing, and a member on the county commission got him the use of the county’s press.

The book

The Little Red Book, 1946

A reading of the Steps for beginners, 123 pages, bound in maroon cloth in a 1948 printing. Later printings called it “An Orthodox Interpretation.”

Twenty-Four Hours a Day, 1948

“…so that he could sell copies for $1.50.”

A small black book with a page for each day of the year, Hazelden wrote in 2024. The Big Book had come out at $3.50 in 1939.

AA’s answer

The Little Red Book, 1946

“Here at the Foundation we are not policemen…”

Bill W. to Barry C., November 1950, as an AA central office quoted the letter on its website in 2017, without showing it. Bill added that he might someday write “an introduction book” himself (Wit’s End tells the book he wrote).

Twenty-Four Hours a Day, 1948

“The publication rights of Twenty-Four Hours a Day not be accepted.”

A floor action at AA’s General Service Conference of April 1954, as an online timeline gives it. Richmond had offered AA the book, and its income, in 1953.

What became of it

The Little Red Book, 1946

It ran to at least twenty-five printings by 1970. Hazelden took it over in 1967, 1970, 1971 or 1976, depending on the source, and still sells it.

Twenty-Four Hours a Day, 1948

“Although I only compiled the book, I am naturally very pleased at its wide acceptance…”

Richmond to Hazelden’s president, April 1958. It was Hazelden’s first book, and by Hazelden’s count sold almost 5,000 copies its first year.

A label, not a ban

AA published neither book, and banned neither. In 1951 its first General Service Conference asked that AA’s own “textbook literature” carry Conference approval, and a note printed with the vote said: “No desire to review, edit, or censor non-Foundation material was implied.”

For a closer look

Go deeper

How much Dr. Bob had to do with the red book; the different accounts of AA’s no to the black one; and four dates for Hazelden and the red book.

Did Dr. Bob sign off?

Later accounts give Dr. Bob a part in the red book. Wally P., who later led a revival of the 1940s beginners’ classes, said in a talk in 1996 that a manuscript went to Dr. Bob and “He approved the manuscript.” Glenn C. wrote in 2005 that Dr. Bob “sent a lot of comments to Ed” as the early printings came out.

The one document seen for this page is a handwritten letter of December 29, 1946, known from a dealer’s listing. As the dealer transcribes it, Dr. Bob wrote, “I have enjoyed your little book very much,” and said he knew it would help many. It says nothing about editing, though the dealer’s listing says Dr. Bob edited the book.

In 2008 Glenn C. passed on the view of another member, Jack H., that the 1949 printing was “the last edition where Dr. Bob had had any input into the book.” Dr. Bob died in November 1950 (Legacy, in I Just Work Here).

Who said no, and when?

A history posted on an AA history website in 2020 says Richmond W. asked AA’s New York office in 1953 to take the book over, “but his request was turned down.”

Hazelden, in May 2024, puts the refusal later. Its president had written to Richmond by February 1954, and Richmond answered that he would consider Hazelden’s offer if AA’s Conference decided against the book. Another Hazelden piece that year says AA’s General Service Board declined; the trustees only took that name after the Conference of April 1954.

An online timeline of that Conference, April 21 to 25, 1954, lists the floor action that the rights “not be accepted.” It isn’t in the published list of the Conference’s advisory actions, as searched for this page.

No official reason has been found. The 2020 history guesses that New York was short of money, staff and space, with the Twelve and Twelve just out. At the same Conference, Bill W. wrote that July, the delegates voted sixty-eight to seven to suspend group discounts on AA’s own two books.

When did Hazelden get the red book?

Hazelden’s store dates its edition to 1967.

A member who described his copies in 2008 found Hazelden’s name on the title page of the twenty-fourth printing, of 1970, with a Coll-Webb copyright of 1957 on the next page. A dealer says that printing was printed by Coll-Webb.

The Hindsfoot Foundation’s account says Coll-Webb printed it, with the Nicollet Group as sponsor, until Ed W.’s death in 1971. A Spanish-language AA history blog, citing Glenn C., gives 1976.

Damian McElrath’s history of the book, published by Hazelden in 2014 and drawing on Ed’s letters with Bill W. and Dr. Bob, may settle it. It wasn’t seen for this page.

Sources