# How many members did A.A. have in 1939?

**In short:**
- When the Big Book came out in April 1939, A.A. had about a hundred members. The book's own foreword says "more than one hundred men and women" (p. xiii).
- They were mostly in two places: Akron, Ohio (with Cleveland nearby) and New York, plus a few scattered "twos and threes and fives" elsewhere (p. 162).
- By the end of 1939, after a magazine article brought hundreds of inquiries, the 1955 foreword says about 800 alcoholics were estimated to be on their way to recovery (p. xviii).

## What the 1939 text says

**Foreword to the First Edition.** Its first sentence says the members of Alcoholics Anonymous "are more than one hundred men and women who have recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body" (p. xiii). It gives that small number as the reason for anonymity: they were "too few, at present" to handle all the appeals the book might bring (p. xiii).

**Chapter 11, "A Vision for You."** Footnotes in today's edition mark these passages "Written in 1939" (pp. 161, 162). The chapter describes the groups as they were:
- In the first city (Akron), the three original men had "succeeded with seven more" a year and a half later (p. 159). By 1939 the weekly meeting at a member's home drew "sixty or eighty as a rule," counting families who drove in from nearby towns (p. 161).
- A community thirty miles away "has fifteen fellows of Alcoholics Anonymous" (p. 161).
- In an eastern city (New York) there were informal meetings "where you may now see scores of members" (p. 162).
- Elsewhere, "Little clusters of twos and threes and fives of us have sprung up in other communities" (p. 162).

**Personal stories.** The first edition's story section held 28 stories, eighteen from Akron (two of them by Clevelanders) and ten from New York (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957); P-44 also gives 28 (P-44).

## Other early counts
- **Dr. Silkworth, July 1939.** In the first medical paper about A.A., reprinted in *A.A. Comes of Age*, he wrote that "These ex-alcoholic men and women number about one hundred at present." (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957, reprinting Silkworth, July 1939). He describes one group along the Atlantic seaboard centred on New York and a somewhat larger one in the Middle West (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957).
- **Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick's 1939 review**, also reprinted there, calls the book "the pooled experience of one hundred men and women" (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957).
- **Foreword to the Second Edition (1955).** "The membership had then reached about 100 men and women." (p. xvii). It adds that in late 1937 enough members had lasting sobriety to convince them their way worked (p. xvii).
- ***A.A. Comes of Age* (1957).** When the book was printed, "The A.A. fellowship then had just about a hundred members." (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957). In November 1937 Bill and Dr. Bob had counted upwards of forty alcoholics staying sober (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957).
- **Bill W., 1969** (talk printed in P-53): "By 1939, membership in A.A. had reached about 100" (P-53).

All of these agree: about a hundred.

## The end of 1939

The 1955 foreword says that after *Liberty* magazine ran "Alcoholics and God" in the fall of 1939, about 800 inquiries came into the New York office (p. xviii). New groups started, and "By the end of 1939 it was estimated that 800 alcoholics were on their way to recovery." (p. xviii). That is an estimate of people on their way, not a count of members.

## One figure that stands apart

In "Bill's Story" (Chapter 1), today's text says that in one western city and its surroundings "there are one thousand of us and our families" (p. 15), and that informal gatherings may draw "from 50 to 200 persons" (Chapter 1, p. 16). That count includes families, so it isn't a member count. The Preface says the program portion of the book "has been left largely untouched" since 1939 (p. xi), but our sources have only the fourth edition's text of Chapter 1, so it can't confirm that this sentence reads exactly as it did in the first printing. Every other 1939 source in our sources say about a hundred members.

## Read it yourself
- Foreword to the First Edition (pp. xiii–xiv), free from A.A.: https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_forewordfirstedition.pdf
- Chapter 11, *A Vision for You* (pp. 151–164): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt11.pdf
- Foreword to the Second Edition (pp. xv–xxi): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_forewordsecondedition.pdf
- Chapter 1, *Bill's Story* (pp. 1–16): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt1.pdf
- *A.A. Comes of Age* is sold by A.A. World Services: https://onlineliterature.aa.org
- Related: *Why was the Big Book written, and when?* · *What changed in A.A. between 1939 and 1950?*

## Sources
| Source | Pages | Date |
|---|---|---|
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Foreword to the First Edition | xiii | 1939 |
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 11, "A Vision for You" | 159–162 | 1939 |
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 1, "Bill's Story" | 15–16 | 1939 text, as printed in the fourth edition |
| Foreword to the Second Edition | xvii–xviii | 1955 |
| Dr. W. D. Silkworth, *Journal-Lancet* paper, reprinted in *A.A. Comes of Age* | — | July 1939 (reprinted 1957) |
| Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick's review, reprinted in *A.A. Comes of Age* | — | 1939 (reprinted 1957) |
| *A.A. Comes of Age* | — | 1957 |
| P-44, *A.A.'s Legacy of Service* | — | text through 1955; pamphlet © 2018 |
| P-53, Bill W.'s last major talk | — | October 1969; pamphlet © 2017 |

Big Book page numbers are from the fourth edition (2001).

*Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. Quotations are brief and cited; the Big Book,* A.A. Comes of Age, *P-44 and P-53 are © A.A. World Services, Inc.*