News — Doctor Bob

Doctor Bob (Robert Holbrook Smith, 1879-1950) was one of the co-founders of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), along with Bill Wilson (Bill W.). He is considered one of the key figures in the development and early history of AA. Doctor Bob was a physician from Akron, Ohio and he struggled with alcoholism for many years. He had tried various methods to stop drinking, including institutionalization and the then-popular "belladonna cure" (a treatment that involved injecting large amounts of the drug belladonna), but nothing seemed to work. In 1935, he met Bill Wilson, who was also an alcoholic and had recently had a...