Dick B.’s Documented Account
of the Story of Bill Wilson, Alcoholics Anonymous, and the Influences on Wilson
[In reply to a question about Oxford Group influences, if any, on Bill Wilson]
Dick B.
Copyright 2012 Anonymous. All rights resereved
“Thank you for asking about the possible influence of the
Oxford Group on Bill Wilson.
Actually, there were many influences on his A.A. ideas, as
there were in the case of Dr. Bob: They definitely include, and I have
documented, the following:
1. The Bible.
2. The Christian organizations and people that preceded and
influenced AA: a) Evangelists like Dwight Moody and F. B. Meyer; b) Gospel
Rescue Missions; c) Lay brethren of Young Men's Christian Association; d)
Salvation Army; e) Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor; f) Oxford
Group; g)Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr.
3. The Christian
upbringing of Wilson in the East Dorset Congregational Church, the Bible
studies he did with grandfather Griffith and friend Mark Whalon, the conversion
and cure of his grandfather Willie Wilson, the sermons and revivals and
conversions and temperance meetings he attended, his 4 years at Burr and Burton
Academy where he took a four year Bible study course, went to daily chapel at
this Congregationalist school, and was president of and active in the school's
Young Men's Christian Association.
5. The advice of his physician Dr. Silkworth on his third
visit to Towns Hospital; that he would die or go insane if he didn't stop
drinking; and that the Great Physician Jesus Christ could cure him.
6. The visits from his friend Ebby Thacher, telling him: a)
that he (Ebby) had been to the altar at Calvary Rescue Mission, been born
again, got religion; b) that he (Ebby) had learned several things from the
Oxford Group friends (Rowland Hazard, Shep Cornell, and Cebra Graves) about
Christian subjects he had studied as a youngster, and also about the power of
prayer, about the Oxford Group[ program, about Dr. Carl Jung's advice to
Rowland that he (Rowland) could be helped if he had a "vital religious
experience"--a conversion experience;] c) Bill's trip to Calvary Church to
hear and check up on Ebby Thacher's testimony; d) Bill's thought that perhaps
Calvary Mission could do for him what it had done for Ebby; e) Bill's trip to
the altar at Calvary Mission where he made his decision for Jesus Christ, wrote
twice "For sure I had been born again," and wrote that he had
"found religion." f) Bill's subsequent drinking, deep despair and
depression, and thoughts that he should call on the Great Physician for help;
g) Bill's last trip to Towns Hospital where he cried out to God for help, had
his memorable "indescribably white flash" blazing in his room, sensed
the presence of God, exclaimed "So this is the God of the
Scriptures," stopped doubting the power of God, and never drank again.
7. Bills subsequent discussion with Dr. Silkworth where Bill
was told he had had a "conversion experience." Bill's extensive study
that day of the William James book on religious experiences that cured
alcoholics, and Bill's conclusion that his experience in the hospital was a
valid conversion experience.
8. Bill's adventure on discharge from the hospital out on
the streets with a Bible under his arm and telling drunks in hospitals,
missions, flea bag hotels, Oxford Group meetings that he had found a cure for
alcoholism and that they should give their lives to God (See Big Book, page
191).
9. Bill's utter failure to convert or sober up anyone at
all. Not before he met with Dr. Bob in Akron.
10. Bill's visit with Dr. Bob at Henrietta Seiberling's Gate
Lodge for six hours where Bill convinced Bob that the idea of service to others
was an essential element in the Oxford Group that was part of the mix, and Dr.
Bob's assent.
11. The three months that Bill spent with the Smiths at
their home in Akron where: a) Anne read them the Bible each day. b) Anne may
have shared from the journal she had kept since 1933. c) there were daily
prayers and quiet time. d) there was an
agreement that hospitalization was an essential ingredient. e) Attendance at
the weekly "clandestine lodge" meeting of the Oxford Group at the T.
Henry Williams home. f) Where extensive Oxford Group and Shoemaker literature
were available at the meeting for the taking.
12. The success--when there was no Big Book, were no Steps,
were no Traditions, were no drunkalogs, and were no meetings like those
today--with A.A. Number Three-Bill Dotson. Bill and Bob visited Dotson in the
hospital, told him to give his life to God and, when healed, go out and help
others. Dotson turned to God for help, was immediately healed, and went out
from the hospital a new man--which marked the founding of Akron Group Number
One July 4, 1935.
13. Bill and Bob learning in November of 1937 by
"counting noses" that forty members had achieved and maintained some
sobriety--with an assured 50% success rate; and that God had shown them how the
cure could be passed on by working with newcomers, hospitalization, belief in
God, acceptance of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, old fashioned prayer
meetings, Bible study meetings, Quiet Time, reading Christian literature, and
helping others without charge.
14. When Akron, by a barely passing vote in Akron,
authorized Wilson to write a book, Bill claimed there were six word-of-mouth
ideas being used with success. He phrased the six ideas in at least 4 different
ways--when it came to God's help. He claimed they were derived from the Oxford
Group, but that there was no general agreement, particularly in the mid-west ,
on what they were. He also said they were applied according to the
"whim" of the group involved. But Bill's "six" word-of-mouth ideas were very
different from the 7 point Akron Christian Fellowship program that Frank Amos
summarized in his report to the Rockefeller people in 1937. See DR. BOB and the
Good Oldtimers, 131.
15. Bill soon sat down with Rev. Sam Shoemaker at the
book-lined study at Calvary House--with closed doors--and worked out the
program of the Big Book, derived largely from Oxford Group ideas (and the
Oxford Group itself declared that the principles of the Oxford Group were the
principles of the Bible--as Rev. Sherwood Day twice wrote in The Principles of the Oxford Group).
16. When it came time to write Chapter 5 of his new book,
Bill asked Sam Shoemaker to write the 12 Steps, but Shoemaker declined saying
that they should be written by an alcoholic, namely Bill. Bill then sat down,
looked at his alleged "six ideas", and quickly wrote out Twelve Steps in a book
where the word "God" had consistently been used without
qualification.
17. Just before the book went to press, four people (Ruth
Hock-secretary, Hank Parkhurst--Bill's partner, Bill Wilson--the author, and
John Henry Fitzhugh Mayo--who wanted the book to be Christian to the core)
changed the language of the steps, deleting God from Step Two, and adding
"as we understood Him" to Steps 3 and 11. Bill attributed this change
to a "broad highway" to the contributions of the atheists and
agnostics.
Most of this material can be found in various of my books
listed in http://www.dickb.com/titles.shtml.
And the material is placed in updated, comprehensive,
documented, teachable form in "The Dick B. Christian Recovery Guide,"
3rd ed., 2010. http://www.dickb.com.
Most of the recent, documented research is set forth in my
two preceding books "Dr. Bob of Alcoholics Anonymous"
http://www.dickb.com/drbobofaa,shtml, and "The Conversion of Bill W."
http://www.dickb.com/conversion.shtml.
dickb@dickb.com
