wrote the famous Chapter Five “How It Works” in the Big Book manuscript. See Dick B., The Conversion of Bill W.: More on the Creator’s Role in Early A.A. (Kihei, HI: Paradise Research Publications, Inc., 2006), 149-86.
So it Was Bill Wilson, and Bill Wilson Alone, Who Wrote the Twelve Steps in December, 1938
Recently, several anti-A.A. commentators have laid out historically inaccurate, conjectural, and totally erroneous ideas as to how Bill received some alleged spiritualist-like guidance as he penned the steps. But Bill was simply writing down ideas with which he had been thoroughly familiar in the Oxford Group and from his talks with Rev. Sam Shoemaker—from 1934 on.
The historical facts are simple. They are well-documented. And they show the long trail in Bill Wilson’s life that led from his tutors—Rowland Hazard, F. Shepard Cornell, and Ebby Thacher to him; from his extensive Oxford Group meeting attendance from1934 to August of 1937 when he and Lois left the Oxford Group (See Lois Remembers, 91-94); and from his long conferences with, and teachings by, Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr. concerning the step ideas themselves. These well-recorded sources led to Bill’s own incorporation in his Big Book of the Oxford Group ideas that were codified into his Twelve Steps just prior to publication of the Big Book in 1939. A.A.’s own ‘Pass It On,’ said this about the writing:
Bill was about to write the famous fifth chapter, ‘How It Works.’ The basic material for the chapter was the word-of-mouth program that Bill had been talking about ever since his own recovery. It was heavy with Oxford Group principles, and had in addition some of the ideas