Dr. Bob was Robert Holbrook Smith (1879–1950), an Akron, Ohio surgeon and one of A.A.'s two co-founders. He drank heavily for most of his adult life. After meeting Bill W. in 1935 he took his last drink on June 10, 1935, the date A.A. counts as its beginning. From then until his death in 1950 he worked with alcoholics in Akron, more than 5,000 of them by A.A.'s count, many in the alcoholic ward at St. Thomas Hospital with Sister Ignatia, and he never charged them for his medical care. His own words about why he did it are plain and practical, and they're in the Big Book as the first personal story, "Doctor Bob's Nightmare."

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Who was Dr. Bob?

In short:

Dr. Bob was Robert Holbrook Smith (1879–1950), an Akron, Ohio surgeon and one of A.A.'s two co-founders.
He drank heavily for most of his adult life. After meeting Bill W. in 1935 he took his last drink on June 10, 1935, the date A.A. counts as its beginning.
From then until his death in 1950 he worked with alcoholics in Akron, more than 5,000 of them by A.A.'s count, many in the alcoholic ward at St. Thomas Hospital with Sister Ignatia, and he never charged them for his medical care.
His own words about why he did it are plain and practical, and they're in the Big Book as the first personal story, "Doctor Bob's Nightmare."

In his own words (written 1939)

"Doctor Bob's Nightmare" opens the personal stories in the Big Book. He wrote it when he was "nearly four years" sober (p. 180). It names no places, but tells the whole arc:

Childhood. An only child in a small New England village, made to go to church so often that he resolved never to go again once he was free, and kept that resolution for forty years (pp. 171–172). He thought being an only child "perhaps engendered the selfishness" that helped bring on his alcoholism (p. 172).
College and medical school. Heavy drinking from college on (p. 172). In medical school he left once, came back, and later handed in blank exam books because his hand shook too much to hold a pencil; he had to stay dry for two more quarters to graduate (pp. 173–174).
Practice. After an internship he opened an office, and drank to ease his stomach trouble; he checked himself into sanitariums at least a dozen times (p. 174). Through Prohibition and after, he spent about seventeen years in a cycle of drinking at night and sedatives in the morning so he could work (pp. 175–177). "It was really a horrible nightmare" (p. 177).
The spiritual search that didn't work. For two and a half years before meeting Bill he studied the spiritual ideas of a group he had met, read everything, and still got drunk every night (p. 178).
The meeting. A man who knew alcoholism from his own experience "talked my language" (p. 180). His last drink was June 10, 1935 (p. 180).

He gives four reasons he spends so much time passing it on: a sense of duty, pleasure, paying his debt to the man who passed it to him, and "a little more insurance for myself against a possible slip" (p. 181). He also admits his craving for liquor stayed with him for the first two and a half years (p. 181).

The book's introduction to the story calls him a co-founder and says the Society's birth "dates from his first day of permanent sobriety, June 10, 1935" (p. 171). It says that to 1950, the year he died, he carried the message to more than 5,000 alcoholics and gave all of them his medical services "without thought of charge" (p. 171).

The facts of his life (P-53)

A.A.'s pamphlet The Co-Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous (P-53, © 2017) gives the biographical outline (P-53): - Born August 8, 1879, in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, the only son of Judge and Mrs. W. P. Smith. - St. Johnsbury Academy (1898), Dartmouth College (graduated 1902), then the University of Michigan and further training at Rush in Chicago; medical degree 1910. - Internship at City Hospital, Akron; opened his own office in Akron in 1912 and practised there until he retired in 1948. - Married Anne Ripley in 1915. - In the early 1930s he went to Oxford Group meetings looking for an answer, and kept drinking. - Met Bill W. in May 1935; worked with Sister Ignatia at St. Thomas Hospital, Akron. - Died of cancer at City Hospital, Akron, on November 16, 1950.

P-53 names three things he held in high regard: simplicity, tolerance of other people's ideas, and the belief that one's job in A.A. was to "get sober and stay sober" and "never to be so complacent that we're not willing to extend that help to our less fortunate brothers" (P-53). It adds that he believed "love and service" are the cornerstones of A.A. (P-53). In his last major talk (Detroit, 1948, printed in P-53) he says Bill had learned the value of service in New York, and the kind of service that counts is "giving of yourself" (P-53). He also says the Twelve Steps weren't written until 1938, that he didn't write them, and that in the early days the members leaned on the Bible, the Four Absolutes and daily meetings (P-53).

Later accounts, used with care

A.A. Comes of Age (1957) has Bill's description of the man he met: fifty-five, a Vermonter, a gifted surgeon whose drinking had cost him most of his practice and nearly his home (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957). Bill calls him the friend he was "never to have a hard word" with (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957).

Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers (1980) is a full biography, written after the 1977 General Service Conference approved the project (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980). It is a later book that leans heavily on the memories of people who knew him, and it is careful about that: one oldtimer says people often repeat things Dr. Bob said "that I know he didn't" (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980).

Where the sources differ

Dartmouth. P-53 (© 2017) and Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers (1980) say he graduated from Dartmouth in 1902 (P-53). Bill's 1957 account says he "busted out of Dartmouth College" because of his drinking (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957). Dr. Bob's own 1939 story says he graduated, "but not in the eyes of the Dean" (p. 172).
The internship. P-53 and the 1980 biography put it at City Hospital, Akron (P-53). Bill's 1957 account says his medical school and internship were "in Chicago" (A.A. Comes of Age, 1957). Dr. Bob's 1939 story says only "a western city" (p. 174).

Read it yourself

"Doctor Bob's Nightmare" (pp. 171–181), free from A.A. in Personal Stories Part I: https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_personalstories_partI.pdf
P-53, The Co-Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous, free from A.A.: https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/literature/P-53_0725.pdf
A.A. Comes of Age and Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers are sold by A.A. World Services: https://onlineliterature.aa.org
Related: How did Bill W. and Dr. Bob meet? · When did Dr. Bob die, and what were his last words to A.A.?

Sources

Source	Pages	Date
"Doctor Bob's Nightmare," Personal Stories Part I	171–181	written 1939 (p. 180); the introductory note mentions his death, so it was added after 1950
P-53, biographical sketch	—	pamphlet © 2017
P-53, Dr. Bob's last major talk (Detroit)	—	talk December 1948; first printed 1973
A.A. Comes of Age	—	1957
Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers	—	1980

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, P-53, A.A. Comes of Age and Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers are © A.A. World Services, Inc.; Dr. Bob's 1948 talk in P-53 is © AA Grapevine, Inc.

These pages answer questions about A.A. from A.A.'s own published literature, read in full, with every quote checked word for word against the page it cites. Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. What we read, and when each source was written.