Known to Thousands as Bill W.

Alcoholics Anonymous Founder Dies

By Donald E. Graham

Washington Post Staff Writer

Scores of thousands of people learned for the

First time the name of the man who helped them

Recover from alcoholism when William Griffith

Wilson died of pneumonia in a Miami Hospital

Sunday night.

The New York headquarters of Alcoholics Anonymous

Announced that. Mr. Wilson, retired securities

Analyst, was the man known as Bill., who

Co-founded the AA in. L935.

Mr. Wilson lived in Bedford Hills, N.Y. He was

75. Thirty-six years ago, Mr. Wilson took his

Last drink, ending a career of alcoholism back to

His days as an officer in the First World War.

Mr. Wilson went into a New York City hospital and

Was detoxified - but fell into a severe

Depression:

"Finally it seemed to me as though I were at the

Very bottom of the pit," he later wrote. "All at

Once I found myself crying out, 'If there is a

God, let him show himself! I am ready to do

Anything, anything!'"'

"Suddenly the room lit up with a great white

Light. It seemed to me, in the mind's eye, that I

Was on a mountain and that a wind, not of air,

But of spirit was blowing. And then it burst upon

Me that was a free man.

"I thought to myself, 'So this is the God of the

Preachers''s" Bill W. Did not wait long before

Sharing his experience with a friend, AA's other

Co-founder, Dr. Robert Holbrook Smith of Akron,

Ohio. Once Smith stopped drinking, the two men

Felt they knew that alcoholics could help each

Other recover.

They went to an Akron hospital and met a patient

Who had come In suffering from delirium tremens.

He too got off and stayed off, and helping fellow

Alcoholics recover became the AA tradition.

"They started a chain reaction, one drunk helping

Another," Nancy 0., a congressional assistant,

Said yesterday. "The hand that reached out to me

When I appealed for help was a link in the chain

Going back to Bill W. And Dr. Bob. Bill A., an

Arlington businessman, recalled, that in

December, 1939, when Alcoholics Anonymous was a

Small, little-known group, he went to New York to

Meet Mr. Wilson. The next month Mr. Wilson helped

Start an AA chapter here, the fourth in the

Country. "He came here many times to help us with

Our problems," Bill A. Said, and later, when the

National AA organization faced a financial

Crisis, the Washington chapter came up with the

Funds to rescue it.

Alcoholics Anonymous now has half a million

Members worldwide. "It's by far the most

Successful resource of help in terms of the

Number of people they've treated," said Augustus

Hewlett, executive secretary of the North

American Association of Alcoholism Programs.

Mr. Wilson retired as director of the organization in 1952.

His first book, "Alcoholics Anonymous," written

When the group had only 100 members, has sold

More than 800,000 copies since it was first

Printed in 1939. His other books were "Twelve

Steps and Twelve Traditions,", "Alcoholics

Anonymous Comes of Age," and "The A.A. Way of

Life." Mr. Wilson went to great lengths to

Preserve his anonymity. When he testified in 1969

Before a congressional committee investigating

Alcoholism, television cameras were barred and

Photographs were permitted only from behind.

He turned down honorary degrees and refused to

Have his picture on the cover of Time magazine in

Order to preserve his group's tradition of

Avoiding publicity as individuals.

Mr. Wilson never gave up his efforts at helping

Alcoholics recover. One desperate alcoholic once

Committed suicide In Mr. Wilson's home. Thousands

Of others stopped drinking and resumed the lives

That alcoholism had interrupted.

Mr. Wilson was not boastful about his successes.

"When you consider the enormous ramifications of

This disease, we have just made a scratch on the

Surface." he told Senate committee in l969. He

Was pleased by the increased government attention

To alcoholism that followed the election of

Harold Hughes, a recovered alcoholic, as senator

From Iowa. "This is splashdown day for Apollo,"

He when Hughes first held hearings on alcoholism.

"The impossible is happening."

One Washington member of AA said yesterday, "I

Don't think there's a person in AA, from Harold

Hughes to the man on the Bowery, who doesn't know

That if it wasn't for Bill W. And what he

Started, we'd all be dead."

Mr. Wilson Is survived by. His wife Lois, who

Remained with him during his period of

Drunkenness and helped start the "Al-Anon"

program for families of alcoholics