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A recording of Bill Wilson reading "How It Works" - p 58-60 of the popular text he drafted and published with editorial input from the "first 100" members of Alcoholics Anonymous.

This 19-minute recording of Bill Wilson's talk explains the Three Legacies of AA - Recovery, Unity & Service. Bill gives an example of "service" (carrying the message of recovery) by talking about Ebby's 12-Step call described on p. 8 of Chapter 1, Bill's Story in the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. The talk presents the 5-step program Ebby learned from members of the Oxford Group, especially Rowland Hazard, the "certain American businessman" described on p. 26. Dr. Jung told Rowland he needed a "vital spiritual experience" that Roland had to find on his own; Dr. Jung had tried without success to produce the "huge emotional displacements and rearrangements" associated with the spiritual experience that had helped alcoholics recover since early times.

Reverend Sam Shoemaker of Calvary Episcopal Church met Ebby Thatcher, a newcomer to the Oxford Group brought to him by Rowland Hazard, that "certain American business man" whose contact by the famed psychiatrist, Dr. Carl Jung is described on page 26 of the Big Book.

As a result of these serendipitous events, Reverend Sam came to know Bill Wilson, an alcoholic ex-stockbroker who became a co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Reverend Shoemaker wrote several articles and this piece, an apologia – a justification - for his life.