A Story of How A.A. “Cofounder”
Episcopal Rector Shoemaker is Being “Resurrected” for Benefit of Alcoholics
Anonymous Students and Members
Dick B.
Copyright 2012. All
rights reserved.
This is a story about three AAs, three publishing houses,
and the Episcopal Rector, Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr., whom I came to know
better than the other six. This all happened because I wanted to research,
learn, and write about all the spiritual roots of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I
had discovered the Bible, the Oxford Group, and Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker to be
the least known and understood and the greatest primary sources of the A.A.
program of recovery—both Old school A.A. of Akron, and Big Book A.A. of 1939.
The particular account here is about a man (distinguished
clergyman, preacher, priest, author, and personal friend of Bill Wilson)
virtually unknown to AAs when he appeared on the stage at the invitation of
Bill Wilson to address the 1955 International Convention of A.A. in St. Louis –
when “A.A. Came of Age.” And Bill Wilson reported that entire convention in Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age.
About twenty years ago, I had come to know A.A. author and
publisher Bill Pittman quite well. Via Glenn Abbey Books, a publisher in
Seattle for whom Pittman was a chief executive. Bill had published three of my
early books. They were Anne Smith’s
Journal, The Akron Genesis of Alcoholics Anonymous, and The Oxford Group & Alcoholics Anonymous.
They created quite a stir in those days because the subjects and people had just
never been examined or reported on by a drunk—a Christian drunk who had
recovered, and who had discovered there was lots about A.A. he didn’t know, but
thought very important to understanding the fellowship and recovery.
Pittman phoned me. He told me the president of a large,
prestigious, Christian publishing House—Fleming Revell, had requested him to
write a book about Reverend Shoemaker and A.A. so that Fleming Revell could
then republish the many Shoemaker books in which it had previously had a hand
(some 14 as I count them today). Pittman told me he couldn’t write it and asked
me to do so. I told him I would only do it as a co-author with him in
appreciation of his support for my work to that date. That part of this story
was about AA number one—Bill Pittman—and publisher number one—Fleming H. Revell.
It was also about me—AA number two in the story.
Two things happened that changed the republishing of Fleming
Revell’s Shoemaker book republication plan. First, Bill Pittman phoned to tell
me that the president had left Fleming Revell. Second, Bill said Fleming Revell
had sold out to Baker Book House. But, said Bill, the Shoemaker book was still
in the picture. So. For the second publisher—Baker Book House, I wrote most of
the Shoemaker book for and with Bill. Baker Book House published it under the
title Courage to Change. And, after
that, Bill told me Baker had sold the book rights to Hazelden. Hazelden is
publisher number three and published the Shoemaker Courage to Change book, and still carries it under the title Courage to Change: The Christian Roots of
the Twelve Step Movement. Reports indicated that the first 5,000 were sold
and reprinted. Current reports have indicated that at least 100 books a month
have continuously sold on the foreign and domestic markets.
We’ve now covered three publishers—Fleming H. Revell, Baker
Book House, and Hazelden.
We’ve also covered two of the three AAs—Bill Pittman and
Dick B. Certainly I was one. Pittman occasionally acknowledged publically that
he too was an AA. Sam Shoemaker was not. On the other hand, he played an
important role in the writing of Bill Wilson’s Big Book and Twelve Steps and
became such a close friend and supporter of Bill Wilson that Bill lavished
Shoemaker with praise. Finally Bill wrote a personal letter to Shoemaker—handed
to me by his daughter Nickie. It told him that Bill was naming Shoemaker a “Co-founder
of A.A.”
But Shoemaker was little known to or mentioned by early AAs
until he appeared at the St. Louis Convention. Thereafter, he spoke at the two
A.A. International Conventions. Sam wrote extensively about A.A. and Bill and
the Steps. He even wrote articles published by A.A. in its Grapevine. Then I learned of the eye-witness account of Shoemaker’s
being asked to write the Steps. I became acquainted with Julia Harris. Mrs.
Harris was the widow of Shoemaker’s assistant minister, Rev. W. Irving Harris.
She gave me Rev. Harris’s complete collection of inscribed Shoemaker books and
gave me statements and a personally typed memo by Rev. Harris about Bill Wilson’s
becoming a follower of Jesus Christ at Calvary Mission. She also gave me a copy
of Harris’s important book, The Breeze of
the Spirit. These fully confirmed my own eye-witness evidence that Bill had
asked Sam originally to write the Twelve Steps; and that the two had worked together on the Big Book.
Not surprising since Bill later worked closely with the two Jesuit priests—Ed Dowling
and another self-acknowledged editor—on Bill’s Alcoholics Anonymous Comes of Age and Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions.
Courage to Change: The
Christian Roots of the Twelve Step Movement is now available in electronic
form as a Hazelden publication. Through ensuing years of research, interviews,
and study, I became well acquainted with all of Shoemaker’s books, with his
daughters and his personal diaries that they reviewed with my son and myself,
and with the 58 boxes of Shoemaker papers we investigated for about a week at
the Episcopal Church Archives in Austin, Texas.
Then came the Pittsburgh edition of our major Shoemaker
work: New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam
Shoemaker, and A.A. Also my review of Shoemaker’s first radio show and his
writings and practices on Quiet Time—along with the devotionals he recommended.
These were embodied in our second major Shoemaker work: Good Morning!: Quiet Time, Morning Watch, Meditation, and Early A.A. From
all these, we have been able to piece together the extensive Shoemaker words,
language, and idea that can be found and compared to language in the Big Book
and Twelve Steps. And, while writers still attribute A.A.’s roots to the Oxford
Group and then criticize that group and its founders, we now have an extensive
body of A.A. root sources, language, and ideas that really did comes from an
abundance of Oxford Group writings, an abundance of Shoemaker writings, and an
abundance of early AA reports and stated studies of their study, effort, and use
of the Bible. The Bible sources were also most assuredly evident in the very language
of the Big Book itself and in recorded statements of Dr. Bob, his wife Anne,
Henrietta Seiberling, and others of the founders.
One new excellent Shoemaker reference source has emerged through
the third AA in our story—Carl Tuchy Palmieri. Publishing and republishing
under his own name and distributing through his Healing Habits.com, Tuchy
Palmieri has begun to complete the task undertaken some twenty years ago—the republishing
of vital, inspirational, historically relevant Shoemaker books. And there
appear to be more to come.
Those already
republished include his The Foundations
of A.A.: Children of the Second Birth, More Twice Born Men, and Twice Born Men. They also include his republished
Shoemaker books: Children of the Second
Birth, Twice Born Ministers, and The
Conversion of the Church.
There are many more Shoemaker books that are directly
relevant to A.A.’s roots and--all but one of these--were published before A.A.
was founded. They include: A Young Man’s
View of the Ministry (1923), Confident
Faith (1932), If I Be Lifted Up (1931),
One Boy’s Influence (1925), Realizing Religion (1923), Religion That Works (1928), The Breadth and Narrowness of the Gospel (1929),
The Gospel According to You (1934),
and also “The Way to Find God,” Calvary
Evangel, August, 1935.
We have reviewed all of these in New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker, and A.A. We gathered
them together, along with many Shoemaker papers and articles, and—thanks to the
funding by benefactors—we were able to place them in Shoemaker’s second major
church in the Shoemaker Room of Calvary Episcopal Church in Pittsburgh. We have
sent our New Light book to Episcopal
newspapers, to every Episcopal Bishop in the many U.S. dioceses, and to other
Episcopal leaders and agencies. We have also sent them to every A.A. office for
which we had a mailing address—again with the help of benefactors. And we hope
to see Tuchy republish as many of these as his mission and resources make
possible for him.
Gloria Deo
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