17 Juin 1951 : 11° anniversaire du 1° Clubhouse AA

Publié le 17 juin 2023 par kreizker

334-1-2 West 24th Street - New York City

This invitation from 1951 was sent to group secretaries, inviting all group members to celebrate the 11th anniversary of what was referred to as AA's Shrine, the first AA Clubhouse in the World. This open house ran from noon to midnight.

http://www.kreizker.net/article-28104940.html

The Clubhouse

From Grapevine February 1951 ------"On June 18, 1940, the cryptic letters 'AA' went up on a battered green doorway in the undistinguished neighborhood of New York's once elegant Chelsea district. It wasn't a very auspicious doorway, nor a conspicuous sign."

"Nevertheless, on that memorable day New York laid claim to its only AA 'shrine.' And drunks, being wonderful hurry-up guys who think nothing of telescoping time, have, in less than eleven years, endowed it with layers of sentiment and tradition such as no ordinary institution could acquire in a century."

"The now famous 'Twenty-fourth Street Clubhouse' is still actively in the AA orbit. After serving as 'General Headquarters' for the entire metropolitan area for four and a half years it was taken over, in December 1944, by the Seamen's group. Today, renamed the Helmsmen's Club, refurbished and made infinitely more attractive than it used to be, it still serves the seafaring drunks who seek the AA way of life."

"Just mention to a New York old timer "Twenty-fourth Street" and watch his eyes light up. The affection in which so many hold the place is not for its good points but, as is the case with human beings, for its frailties."

"The funny entrance, so difficult to find, is marked by its cockeyed address--334 1/2! Wedged in between two old-fashioned brick-fronts, the '1/2' number confirms the fact that there wasn't supposed to be any doorway there at all. Let's pretend that you are weaving your uncertain way along 24th Street looking for an address which your common sense tells you doesn't exist. Like so many others before and since, you do find the place. With shaking hand you push open the door. You're in a little vestibule and, if you're like most of us, you hesitate. . .that final split second of indecision, shall I go in, or shall I go back for one more drink?"

"Onward! you say. And you open the inner door to find--nothing! Nothing, that is, except a long, bare, tunnel-like and mysterious looking hallway. Leading to what?"

"Actually this is merely the passageway between the two houses back to the oddity of an 'extra building' built in the rear, over what had once been the 'gardens."

"It was Bill who first christened this hall 'The Last Mile'--and hundreds of us who since have reluctantly trod its forbidding length agreed that it was, in truth, a lot like walking the corridor of doom."

"You too are scared a little as you journey the full length of 'The Last Mile. 'But ultimately you step into the inner sanctum which, on first sight, has been a lot of things to a lot of people, friendly, humble, quiet, restful--and somehow a little frightening."

"This was the 'meeting room.' An old upright piano, a card table or two, a few nondescript chairs and, of course, people. But the center of the room to your newcomer's eye was the fireplace, pine panelled, with a plain wooden mantel and, over it. . .the first time you ever saw it. . .the sign reading--"But For The Grace of God. . ."

Later this was to also become the Headquarters for Al-Anon for 5 years until it became too small for its needs...