and be well on the way to becoming a national
institution.
The man who played a key role in this lightning change
was Jack Alexander, a 38-year-old writer for The Saturday
Evening Post, which, with more than 3 million
circulation, was the leading family magazine in the
United States. The article he wrote about A.A. for the March 1,
1941 edition of the magazine -- simply titled "Alcoholics
Anonymous " -- brought in 7,000 inquiries and became
the high point of his illustrious career. The article apparently led
other publications to offer similar reports of the
Fellowship's work, launching A.A. on a publicity roll that
lasted for years.
Alexander's article is still circulating today as a pamphlet
issued by A.A. World Services, with the title "The Jack
Alexander Article about A.A." Though it focuses on the
A.A. of 1941, it still provides important information about
alcoholism, how the Fellowship started, and what was
working so well for those whom we would now call A.A.
pioneers. The article has also been praised as an excellent
example of good organization and writing that could be a
model for journalism students. (The late Maurice Z., an
A.A. member and also a highly successful magazine writer
and biographer, told an A.A. session at the 1985
International Convention in Montreal that he had been
impressed by the article back in 1941, long before he felt
his own need to embrace the program it described!)
How did this fortunate publicity come about? What
inspired it and who was responsible for bringing the idea
to the attention of the Post's editors and nursing the story
through to acceptance and completion?
The account of A.A.'s famous appearance in The
Saturday Evening Post is the kind of story that gives some
A.A. members goose bumps, because they see it as the
sure work of Higher Power. Others would just call it a
chain of coincidences that worked out favorably for the
Fellowship. Whatever the case, its publication in 1941 was
a bombshell breakthrough for A.A. at a critical time.
The process actually started in February 1940, when
Jim B., one of the A.A. pioneers in New York City, moved
to Philadelphia, the headquarters city of The Saturday
Evening Post. Jim started an A.A. group in the city and,
through a chance meeting at a bookstore, attracted the
interest of Dr. A. Wiese Hammer, who with colleague Dr.
C. Dudley Saul, became an enthusiastic A.A. advocate. Dr.
Hammer just happened to be a close friend of Curtis Bok,
owner of The Saturday Evening Post. After hearing Dr.
Hammer's strong endorsement of A.A., Bok passed along
to his editors a suggestion that they consider an article
about the Fellowship. The suggestion landed on the desk
of Jack Alexander, one of the Post's star reporters.
Alexander was a seasoned writer who (according to
Bill W.) had just covered some rackets in New Jersey. (This
gave rise to an untrue belief that he thought A.A. might
also be a racket.) Born in St. Louis, he had worked for
newspapers and The New Yorker before joining the Post.
Alexander deserves much credit for probing deeply into a
struggling society that scarcely impressed him as he started
his research. Though assigned to do the story by his
superiors, he could have made a superficial review of A.A.
activity in New York City and then abandoned the project
as "not having much merit." Indeed, he would write four
years later that he was highly skeptical following his first
contact with four members of A.A. who called at his
apartment one afternoon. "They spun yarns about their
horrendous drinking misadventures," he wrote. "Their
stories sounded spurious, and after the visitors had left, I
had a strong suspicion that my leg was being pulled. They
had behaved like a bunch of actors sent out by some
Broadway casting agency."
But Alexander was too much the professional to give
up based on one unsatisfactory interview session. The
next morning, he met Bill W. at A.A.'s tiny Vesey Street
general service offices in downtown Manhattan. They hit
it off immediately. Alexander described Bill as "a very disarming
guy and an expert at indoctrinating the stranger
into the psychology, psychiatry, physiology, pharmacology
and folklore of alcoholism. He spent the good part of a
couple of days telling me what it was all about. It was an
interesting experience, but at the end of it my fingers
were still crossed. I knew I had the makings of a readable
report but, unfortunately, I didn't quite believe in it and
told Bill so."
At this point, Alexander could have shelved the assign-
ment for later consideration or dropped it altogether. But Bill
W. was determined not to let that happen. He dropped
everything and persuaded Alexander to investigate A.A.
in other cities, especially Akron and Cleveland. As Bill recalled
later, "Working early and late, [Jack] spent a whole month
with us. Dr. Bob and I and the elders of the early groups at
Akron, New York, Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Chicago
spent uncounted hours with him. When he could feel A.A.
in the very marrow of his bones, he proceeded to write
the piece that rocked drunks and their families all over the
nation."
Alexander recalled that A.A. in those cities had impressed him
mightily. "The real clincher came, though, in St. Louis, which
is my home town," he remembered. "Here I met a number of my
own friends who were A.A.s, and the last remnants of skepticism
vanished. Once rollicking rumpots, they were now
sober. It didn't seem possible, but there it was."
Now a firm believer in A.A., Alexander finished the
article and sent it to Bill and Dr. Bob for review. They
suggested only minor changes, though the correspondence
between Bill and Jack reveals that Bill wanted no mention
of the Oxford Group, a fellowship which had given A.A. its
fundamental principles but after 1936 had begun falling
fast in the public favor. Alexander said his editors felt the
story required some mention of the Oxford Group, but he
minimized it.
Then the Post made a request that could have sunk the
project. The editors wanted photos to illustrate the article
and this, Bill thought, would violate the Society's anonymity.
But when the editors said the article wouldn't be published
without photos, Bill agonized for a moment and
then quickly decided the opportunity was too important to
pass up. Thus one photo in Alexander's article showed Bill
and seven others grouped in the old 24th Street Clubhouse
in Manhattan, though the cutline carries no names. The
lead photo, also unidentified, depicted a drunk using a
towel to study his hand while taking a drink, and a second
photo showed a man on a hospital bed being visited by
three A.A. members. Another photo showed a person
being carried into the hospital on a stretcher.
Published on March 1, 1941, the Alexander piece
brought a response that almost overwhelmed the
resources at the small Vesey Street office. The Post
forwarded to A.A. thousands of letters pouring in from
across North America. Volunteers had to be called
in to answer the letters, while some were sent to A.A.
members and groups in their places of origin. And since
A.A. still had very little literature of its own, the article
served as an information piece for prospective A.A.
members. In Toledo, Ohio, for example, the members
gave a newcomer named Garth M. several dollars and
sent him out to buy up copies around the city (the
price was then five cents per copy). These then became
part of the group's literature for other newcomers.
Nine years later Alexander penned another Post article
about A.A. titled "The Drunkard's Best Friend."
Though lacking the dramatic impact of the earlier story, it
effectively detailed what A.A. had become and promised
for the future -- a promise that has been fulfilled many
times over. By this time, A.A. had 96,000 members and
was rapidly spreading to countries around the world.
Jack Alexander remained a friend of A.A. throughout
his life, and even served as a nonalcoholic (Class A) trustee
on the A.A. General Service Board from 1951 until 1956. He
was also said to have added "the final editorial touch" to
Bill's manuscript for Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions,
first published in 1952. Alexander became a senior editor
at the Post, and in a special tribute to him at his retirement
in 1961, the Post cited the 1941 Alcoholics Anonymous
piece as his most famous article for the magazine.
In failing health, Jack Alexander and his wife Anita
retired to Florida, where he died on September 17, 1975.
Bill W. had passed away almost five years earlier, so
there was no special tribute for Jack of the kind Bill had
written for other early friends of A.A. But from the Big
Meeting in the Sky, Bill might have praised Jack as a man
who gave us a "ten strike" and with his words virtually
saved the lives of thousands. Even without Jack's wonderful
article, A.A. would have survived and achieved further
growth. But Jack was there at the right time with the right
message for his times. Without Jack's persistence and
strong belief in A.A., many could have gone to their graves
without knowing that a new way of recovery had been discovered
and was working. Bill W. and the other A.A. pioneers
knew that, and they never lost their gratitude for the
star reporter who at first thought his leg was being pulled.
- - - -
From: Charles Knapp
(cpknapp at yahoo.com)
In the Feb/Mar 2008 Box 459 is an article
about Jack Alexander and it touches on this
story about the Jersey rackets.
Hope this helps
Charles
- - - -
Original message #6216 from
(Baileygc23 at aol.com)
Boss Hague: King Hanky-Panky of Jersey
By Jack Alexander
Originally appeared in The Saturday Evening Post
on October 26, 1940
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2002
http://www.cityofjerseycity.org/hague/kinghankypanky/index.shtml
The Honorable Frank Hague, the perpetual mayor of Jersey City, is perhaps
the most eminent mugg in the United States. Hague was a mugg when he was
expelled from the sixth grade at thirteen as a truant and dullard, and be
was
a mugg when he started learning politics the bare-knuckles way in the tough
Horseshoe district of Jersey City in the 1890's. He was still a mugg when
he was elected mayor of that dreary human hive in 1917, in which capacity
he has held the center of the stage ever since with the grim determination
of a bad violinist. Hague will probably he known to history as a strong
character who, despite all temptations to belong to other classifications,
loyally remained a mugg to the end. This is a remarkable achievement when
you
analyze it, for Hanky-Panky, as his admirers sometimes call him, has walked
with the great and good, and their only noticeable effect on him has been
to give him a taste for expensive haberdashery. At heart and in practice, he
is a strong-arm man today, tricked out by a clever tailor to look like a
statesman.
As a wood carver fashions puppets, Hague has created governors, United
States senators, and judges of high and low degree. He has been backslapped
cordially by the President and by men who wanted to be President. He has
bossed the state of New Jersey almost as long as he has ruled Jersey City.
He
has mingled intimately with leaders of medicine and the clergy and, in a
famous civil-liberties case, was firmly kneaded and processed by the august
Supreme Court of the United States. He is listed in Who's Who in America
and,
as vice-chairman of the Democratic National Committee, he is a leader in
the Party of Humanity.
From time to time, in his twenty-three years as mayor, he has enjoyed the
investigative attentions of committees sent by the United States Senate and
the New Jersey legislature and of agents of the Justice and Treasury
departments. He has been a frequent guest at the baronial Duke Farms in
Somerville, New Jersey, and he has dandled a teacup in the parlor of Mrs E.
T.
Stotesbury, the widow of a famous Morgan partner. Yet, in spite of all these
softening influences, he persists in saying, "I have went," and in using
singular subjects with plural verbs, and vice versa. In conversation he
bellows
oracularly and jabs a long finger into his listener's clavicle to emphasize
his
points, most of which boil down to his favorite argumentative phrase,
"You know I'm right about that!" His language, when he is aroused, is
that of the gin mill. He rules his city by the nightstick and the state by
crass political barter. He is loud and vulgar and given to public displays
of
phony piety during which his enemies are dismissed as "Red," or worse.
At sixty-four, he is still erect and muscular, and he is not above
physically assaulting a quailing civil employee whom he has called on the
carpet.
None dares to hit back, for fear of being harassed by Hague's police or
being held up to public disgrace in some devious way.
A legislative committee once determined that during a seven-year period
when Hague's salary, admittedly his only source of income, totaled $56,000,
he purchased real estate and other property for a total outlay of nearly
$400,000. This was done through dummies, and payment was made in cash. Hague
has always shied from bank accounts. Although his salary as mayor is only
$8000, has never exceeded $8500 and has been as low as $6520, Hague lives
like
a millionaire. He keeps a fourteen-room duplex apartment in Jersey City
and a suite in a plushy Manhattan hotel. He owns a palatial summer home in
Deal, New Jersey, for which he paid $125,120 - in cash - and he gambles
regularly on the horse races. Before the present war began he went to Europe
every year, traveling in the royal suites of the best liners. Now he spends
more time in Florida and at Saratoga Springs, where he flashes a bank roll,
held together by a wide rubber hand, which always contains a few $1000
notes, a denomination of which Hague is childishly fond. Hague's public
squanderings have brought Jersey City's municipal finances to a dangerous
pass.
Wholly dominated by Hague, Jersey City is the worst mess of unpunished civic
corruption in the forty-eight states.
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++++Message 6219. . . . . . . . . . . . EURYPAA 2010 seeks speaker and
participants
From: Stockholm Fellowship . . . . . . . . . . . . 1/12/2010 6:03:00 AM
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The 1st Annual All-Europe Young People in A.A.
Convention will be hosted by Stockholm, Sweden,
July 23-25, 2010.
More information at http://www.EURYPAA.org/2010
Spread the word, WE NEED ONE MORE SPEAKER,
AND SOME PANELISTS.
- - - -
The All-Europe Young People in AA Conference Committee is looking for a main
speaker for Saturday night - someone with an obvious connection to Europe,
came
to AA age 30 or younger and now has 10+ years continuous sobriety, and a
woman
is preferred for diversity (Friday night’s main speaker, Craig F., is
male).
Anyone interested, or with a referral, please send an mp3 recording or
online
link to info@eurypaa.org
Panel speakers on a variety of topics will also be needed during the
conference.
AAs from all over the world, and all lengths of sobriety, if you are
interested,
email info@eurypaa.org and tell us a bit about yourself.
EURYPAA does not pay for any speaker travel or accommodations in order to
keep
conference costs low. We ask everyone to think of it as an international
12-step
call on Young People in AA.
The EURYPAA meetings will be recorded. The recordings are for our EURYPAA
archives and people would be able to listen to them online for free; we are
not
going into the business of selling speaker tapes. It is our hope that young
people throughout Europe will be able to hear the experience, strength and
hope
of the EURYPAA speakers and seek out AA in their area, or contact us via our
website to be connected to AA near them.
Hope to see you at EURYPAA 2010!
http://www.EURYPAA.org/2010
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++++Message 6220. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: life of Jack Alexander
From: tomper87 . . . . . . . . . . . . 1/14/2010 6:38:00 PM
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Excerpts from article by Jack Alexander in the
May 1945 Grapevine:
The History of How The Article Came To Be
Jack Alexander of SatEvePost Fame Thought A.A.s Were Pulling His Leg
AA Grapevine, May, 1945
by Jack Alexander
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
"It began when the Post asked me to look into A.A. as a possible article
subject. All I knew of alcoholism at the time was that, like most other
non-alcoholics, I had had my hand bitten (and my nose punched) on
numerous occasions by alcoholic pals to whom I had extended a
hand--unwisely, it always seemed afterward. Anyway, I had an
understandable skepticism about the whole business."
"My first contact with actual A.A.s came when a group of four of them
called at my apartment one afternoon. This session was pleasant, but it
didn't help my skepticism any. Each one introduced himself as an
alcoholic who had gone "dry," as the official expression has it. They
were good-looking and well-dressed and, as we sat around drinking
Coca-Cola (which was all they would take), they spun yarns about their
horrendous drinking misadventures. The stories sounded spurious, and
after the visitors had left, I had a strong suspicion that my leg was
being pulled. They had behaved like a bunch of actors sent out by some
Broadway casting agency."
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++++Message 6221. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: Recovery rates: prescreening was
common in early AA
From: jenny andrews . . . . . . . . . . . . 1/11/2010 12:17:00 PM
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"In one of these (eastern cities) there is
a well-known hospital for the treatment of
alcoholic and drug addiction. ... We are
greatly indebted to the doctor in attendance
there (presumably Towns hospital and Dr.
Silkworth) ... Every few days this doctor
suggests our (AA) approach to one of his
patients.
Understanding our work, he can do this with
an eye to selecting those who are willing and
able to recover on a spiritual basis."
And, by definition, rejecting other patients
whom he believed would not so benefit.
So, as at Akron with Dr Bob's and Sr Ignatia's
screening of patients, success rates were
distorted by already discounting those they
rejected -- even though these other candidates
might have had a desire to stop drinking.
Laurie A.
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++++Message 6222. . . . . . . . . . . . New England Transcendentalism
From: bbthumpthump . . . . . . . . . . . . 1/10/2010 4:14:00 PM
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Immanuel Kant and the Eighteenth Century
Enlightenment formed the basis for the
nineteenth-century intellectual movement which
we call New England Transcendentalism: Ralph
Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), Henry David Thoreau
(1817-1862), etc.
William James (1842-1910), although not
considered a Transcendentalist, was nevertheless
part of that same New England intellectual
world. He was a student at Harvard University
in Cambridge, Massachusetts, from 1861-1869,
and taught there from 1873-1907. Ralph Waldo
Emerson was his godfather.
Bill Wilson was born and raised in New England;
he read and was influenced by William James. I
can't help but speculate that he was also
influenced by Emerson, Thoreau and other
Transcendentalists in and around New England.
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++++Message 6223. . . . . . . . . . . . Re: New England Transcendentalism
From: Glenn Chesnut . . . . . . . . . . . . 1/16/2010 7:18:00 PM
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The Transcendentalists were in part rebels
against the doctrines of the Unitarian Church
which dominated Harvard Divinity School at that
time.
Richmond Walker, the second most-published AA
author ("Twenty-Four Hours a Day") was also
brought up within that same New England world.
Students began reading Transcendentalist-
influenced poetry and so on as early as high
school.
Rich did his college degree at Williams College
in Williamstown, Massachusetts, one of the more
distinguished New England universities, where
the faculty were strongly influenced by
Transcendentalist ideas, and by the kind of
nineteenth-century German idealist philosophy
that was produced under the influence of Immanuel
Kant. The students at Williams College were
strongly encouraged to learn German, and many
of the faculty there had studied at German
universities.
http://hindsfoot.org/rwfla1.html
Rich's father was one of the leaders within the
extreme atheistic wing of the Unitarian Church,
wrote a book defending secular humanism, and
was one of the signatories of the original
Humanist Manifesto.
See Message 4715, "New Information on Richmond Walker"
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AAHistoryLovers/message/4715
It is probably not unfair to see Twenty-Four
Hours a Day as Rich's rebellion against his
father, a rejection of his father's atheism
in which Rich turned to a kind of belief in
God that was much more like Ralph Waldo Emerson's
Over-Soul:
Emerson referred to his Higher Power as "that
great nature in which we rest, as the earth
lies in the soft arms of the atmosphere; that
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