Reference Works

"Names and Events in the A.A. Big Book," assembled over the years by the members of the AA History Lovers, as edited in April 2014 by Glenn Chesnut. This list, organized by the page numbers in the Big Book, may be opened, downloaded, and printed out if desired. Fourteen pages long, a copy of this is a valuable reference tool to have on hand for an A.A. Big Book study group. [PDF, MS Word]

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) Recovery Outcome Rates: Contemporary Myth and Misinterpretation, by Arthur S. (Arlington, Texas), Tom E. (Wappingers Falls, New York), and Glenn C. (South Bend, Indiana). January 1, 2008. Now generally accepted as the best and most accurate figures assembled to date, compiled and analyzed by three internationally recognized AA historians: one a computer scientist, the second one highly skilled in preparing graphs and doing statistical analyses, and the third a historian at a major state university. [PDF, MS Word]

AA HISTORY LOVERS webgroup messages is one of the FOUR MOST IMPORTANT archival sources for A.A. history.

Contains all the AA History Lovers messages from the years they were in operation, from 2002 to 2016. This collection forms one of the four most important archival sources for researchers into the history of the early AA period. There are 11,542 messages in all in this huge collection. If printed out in book form, they would total around 16,000 pages (40 volumes at 400 pages/volume).

98% of the published AA historians belonged to this web group and used it to inform people of their latest discoveries, correct mistakes in the traditional accounts, and discuss important issues.

The group was guided from the beginning by founder NANCY MOYER OLSON (who had been executive assistant to the scholar at the University of Chicago who had published the Chicago Great Books Series), ERNEST KURTZ (who did his Ph.D. at Harvard University, and is regarded as the founder of scholarly AA history and as the top AA historian), and GLENN CHESNUT (who did his doctorate at Oxford University in England, and is regarded as one of the four preeminent AA historians of the years that followed Kurtz's pioneering work).

Another of the major contributors to the AA History Lovers was ARTHUR S. (Arlington, Texas) -- see immediately below -- who put together material from these messages with detailed references to all the major books written on the history of Alcoholics Anonymous, to create his majesterial Narrative Timeline of AA History. It and the AA History Lovers messages need to be read in conjunction with one another by careful scholarly researchers -- this is an absolute necessity -- the two works were created in tandem with one another. Arthur and Glenn Chesnut used to travel together regularly to the National A.A. History Symposiums, and were close co-workers.

When relevant, it is additionally necessary for those who use the AA History Lovers material to consult the massive collection -- see also below -- of Biographies of the Authors of the Stories in the Big Book, as compiled by Nancy Olson and her co-workers, including AL WELCH of Baltimore, and Glenn Chesnut of South Bend, Indiana.

A Narrative Timeline of AA History, by Arthur S. (Arlington, Texas), is one of the most important reference works which serious researchers into AA history need to have at hand while doing their work. In this 134-page document, Arthur gives not only an extended list of the dates and chronology of AA history, but also — for each of these items — careful page references to thirty of the top books on AA history and other sources which the researcher may utilize to learn more on each of these topics. In effect, it is a giant index to a huge collection of some of the best AA historical literature down through the years. And the reader can use the Adobe Acrobat search function to go quickly through the entire length of the document locating all the references to any particular person or topic. Arthur is a computer expert, skilled in numbers and precision calculation, who started his career in Silicon Valley in California, and ended up as an excutive at a major computer company in Arlington, Texas. [PDF]

Biographies of the Authors of the Stories in the Big Book, compiled by Nancy Moyer Olson (the moderator of the AA History Lovers web group) and her co-workers. assembled and organized by Al Welch. edited by Glenn Chesnut. Serious researchers need to read this in conjunction with the messages of the AA History Lovers webgroup and Arthur S.'s Narrative Timeline. [PDF, MS Word]

_{Last reviewed: 03/2020}

Reference Works

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