WOMEN IN EARLY AA - The Lady Known as Lil.
Hi again, Buffs; On April 18 I received an e-mail from Bob M. of our group which I didn't realize hadn't been posted to the whole group. I think it is worth posting, so here it is: To: NMOlson@a... Ethel M. was also the 2nd delegate (panel 3, 1953) to the general service conference. She followed Bill D. of Alcoholics Anonymous Number Three fame. But he was the delegate from Northern Ohio. She represented Northeast Ohio, which is still the name of area 54. BTW, if indeed the Cleveland wives kicked the first woman (Elsie?) out it was because she 13th stepped a guy (Mitch?) on a gurney in Dr. Bob's examining room. Or so the story goes from a usually reliable source. Bob I had heard this story several times and so I did a little research on it. According to Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, page 97: In addition to Eddie there were a couple of other alcoholics around in the summer and fall of 1935 who didn't jell. However, they still deserve to become a part of A.A. folklore. There was a man we'll call 'Victor,' a former mayor of Akron, and a lady we'll call 'Lil,' who was the first woman to seek help. Together, Victor and the lady known as Lil started out to write the 'thirteenth step,' long before the first twelve were ever thought of. What is more, they say it began in Dr. Bob's office -- on his examination table -- while he was at the City Club engaged in his sacrosanct Monday-night bridge game. In any case, Victor decided it was time for him to go home -- but Lil was loaded. So he called Ernie to explain the predicament. When Ernie arrived, he saw Lil grab a handful of little pills from Dr. Bob's cabinet. 'We started going around the examination table, and she was trying to get the pills in her mouth.' Ernie recalled. 'Then she made a dive for the window. I caught her halfway out. She was strong as a horse and used some profanity I never heard before or since. 'I got her quieted, and Doc came. We took her out to Ardmore Avenue and put her in a room in the basement. She stayed there two or three days, and then her people took her home. Of course, they were never too kind about it and thought we didn't handle her right. But we felt we had done all we could for her when she wasn't helping herself any.' They say Dr. Bob was leery of anything to do with women alcoholics for a long time thereafter, although he still tried to help as best he could with any who came along. And Bill Wilson, speaking with Sue Windows [Dr. Bob's daughter] in the 1950's, recalled how they all were scandalized by the episode. 'As drunks, I don't know why we should have been,' Bill said. 'But we felt that the performance of some of those early people coming in would disrupt us entirely. -- [Lil], I guess, was absolutely the first woman we ever dealt with.' Bill thought Lil never made it, but Sue said that she straightened out after a few years, got married, and had children. Only it wasn't in the A.A. program that Lil recovered. That was a lesson, too: A.A isn't the answer for everyone. On page 241, Lil is mentioned again. It says: As far as we know, 'Lil' never got far enough along to attend a meeting. No women ever responded to the Plain Dealer articles, and the first one Warren C. remembered was thrown out of A.A. by the wives. 'She was so bad, they wouldn't allow her in their homes,' he said. But this woman eventually did get sober, according to Clarence S.'s recollections. She started working with children and moved to Florida, where she made a good deal of money in real estate. She stayed away from A.A., however, because of that initial rejection. ****** It is unclear to me whether the woman who moved to Florida and Lil were the same person. It sounds as though there may have been two early women who set back women's acceptance in AA. Does anyone know? Naturally it was Lil who was blamed for the 13th stepping. Victor, I guess, was just an innocent bystander, poor fellow.