By Claudia Black, Ph.D., MSW
Note: This article was originally published in the Spring 2006 edition of Cutting Edge, the online newsletter of The Meadows.
Like every aspect of mankind, addiction has its history. Long before anyone understood the core problems of addiction, people became hooked on substances. The following is adapted from Claudia’s videos The History of Addiction and The Legacy of Addiction.
Chemical dependency has plagued humankind since man first crushed grapes. Each millennium has treated the problems that addiction brings with a methodology unique to the times. Historically, as a way of treating those addicted, society has imprisoned them, banished them, put them in mental institutions, religiously converted them, and, in today’s world.
What hasn’t changed is the impact of chemical dependency, particularly on those addicted and their families.
Addiction Statistics
More than 10% of the US adult population has a substance abuse, with alcohol contributing to 29% of fatal traffic accidents. Studies also show that 2.5 million years of life are lost annually due to excessive alcohol consumption. Anyone can become addicted, with genetic and environmental factors contributing to this disease. As populations have increased, so has drug and alcohol addiction.
The early history of addiction found individuals addicted to plant and alcohol-based substances. Not much has changed in the 21st century except for the substances that people are most addicted to.
The history of substance abuse pegged addiction as a moral failing. People struggling with addiction were thrown in prison or left to die in the streets. The late 20th century brought new technology, such as brain imaging scans that showed the significant effects of drugs and alcohol. As a result, addiction was seen as a disease that could be controlled and treated with various therapy methods.
The Ancient Roots of Addiction
The history of substance abuse is deep and ancient, and the methods used to deal with addicted persons are historically bizarre. The Egyptians used to flog drunkards, the Romans created Bacchus, a God of wine and revelry, and the Turks “cured” drunkenness by pouring molten lead down the throat of the inebriate. Perhaps, this was the first example of aversion conditioning — crude but effective.
The Sumerians
The Sumerians discovered the opium plant in 3,400 BC and derived its first-recorded medical benefits. Initially, opium was ingested before ancients found out that smoking it yielded more significant effects. In the 19th century, opium began to cause conflict between Great Britain and China. At the same time, cocaine and morphine were invested and sold as medicine and anesthetics.
The Chinese
Chinese immigrants brought the poppy plant with them in the 19th century. During this time, people began to struggle with addiction as opium dens became more popular. Opium has since evolved into street heroin, morphine, and derivative analgesics. Today, the opioid crisis has turned into an epidemic, causing the government to declare it a national emergency.
The Greeks
The Greeks believed that the use of amethysts, beautiful deep purple stones, would ward off drunkenness. They adorned their cups with amethysts, wore them when drinking, and even ground them up and put them in their wine.
An early addict you might recognize is Alexander the Great, king of Macedonia in 350 B.C. By 31, he had conquered the world and abstained from intoxicating beverages during his mighty triumphs.
However, after his outstanding achievements, in a short span of two years, Alexander became an alcoholic and ended his career in a series of insane escapades. He burned cities at the request of a courtesan and killed his best friend, and his demise came in a contest of wine drinking. Alexander the Great was 33 years old when he drank himself to death.
The Romans
Winemaking and its export became the economic basis of the Roman Empire. With the collapse of the empire, religious institutions, particularly the monasteries, became the source of brewing and wine-making techniques. It wasn’t until the 19th century that the production of beer, wine, and distilled beverages became efficient and cheap enough to supply inexpensive alcohol to the masses.
Throughout the 19th century and into the early 1900s, alcohol and various drugs — notably morphine, cocaine, and chloral hydrate — were used in multiple combinations as medicines. These “patent” medicines were highly addictive; alcohol content was as high as 95 percent. By the mid-1800s, the problem of addiction was significant and growing.
The Washingtonians
A physician from Battle Creek, Michigan, traveled extensively and used charts to show the effects of alcohol, drugs, and nicotine on the body. Today, you would most likely recognize him as the founder of Corn Flakes. His name was Dr. John Harvey Kellogg.
In the 1840s, the first large temperance group, The Washingtonians, was born. The origin of this movement was a drinking club that met nightly at Chase Tavern in Baltimore, Maryland. One night, 20 chronic drinkers, in a spirit of jest, sent two of the younger members to a temperance lecture.
The two men presented a favorable lecture report upon their return, and an argument concerning abstinence began. This argument would last four days and ended when six members announced their decision to support an abstinence society. This became a massive movement, with a membership of almost five million Americans by 1845, which is notable because it probably marks the beginning of modern-day addiction recovery.
The History of Addiction Treatment
Like Alcoholics Anonymous, the Washingtonians believed in substituting personal experiences for lectures, and they viewed the drunk as a sick person. Perhaps most significant, they also professed a singleness of purpose: to help the drunk. However, politics became an issue and caused the movement’s demise.
America’s most recognizable temperance leader may be Carrie Nation. In 1888, she began a campaign wherein she and her female followers destroyed kegs of liquor and sometimes entire saloons, using stones and trusty hatchets.
In the late 1880s and early 1900s, they practiced some bizarre forms of addiction treatment. The Keeley Cure began in 1880. The treatment involved withdrawing the alcohol or narcotic drug and restoring the nerve cells to their original unpoisoned condition using bichloride of gold, removing the craving for liquor.
Enemas and laxatives then stimulated the elimination of the accumulated poisonous products. (Incidentally, Bill Wilson, co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, was subject to this treatment in 1934.) In 1918, this system had treated more than 400,000 people at various Keeley Institutes. (NOTE: Bichloride of gold did not exist.)
While not concerned primarily with addiction, the Oxford Group, a popular religious movement in the 1930s, was to play an essential role in the future treatment of the disease.
Founding Alcoholics Anonymous
Perhaps, the most successful alcoholism treatment has been Alcoholics Anonymous. Dr. Bob Smith and Bill Wilson founded AA in 1935 in Akron, Ohio. After being called on by an old friend and member of the Oxford Group, Wilson was a drunk who was admitted for his alcoholism to Towns Hospital in New York City in 1934. He remained sober, and his work took him to Akron, where he felt the need to talk to another alcoholic. He was introduced to Dr. Bob Smith, a prominent and persistent drunk. From this meeting emerged the basic premise of Alcoholics Anonymous: one alcoholic helping another alcoholic. The initial Alcoholics Annonymous meetings were held as adjuncts to the Oxford Group on Wednesday nights at Dr. Bob’s house.
Alcoholics Anonymous is a spiritually based program, and its primer is The Big Book. Proposed names for the book were One Hundred Men, Moral Philosophy, The Empty Glass, The Dry Way, and Dry Frontiers. In 1939, 5000 copies were published. Today, there are four editions of The Big Book and millions of copies. Alcoholics Anonymous exists in most countries, with meetings in just about every city globally.
In 1950, Lois Wilson, wife of Bill Wilson, founded Al-Anon, the 12-Step program for families and friends of alcoholics. Alateen was started in 1957.
In 1951, the “Minnesota Model” was developed. The foundation for treatment from the 1970s to the present, this abstinence model is based on the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. It has become the primary protocol for residential and outpatient treatment programs in the United States and many parts of the world.
Defining Alcoholism
In 1952, the American Medical Association defined alcoholism. Still, it wouldn’t be until 1967 that it passed a resolution identifying alcoholism as a complex disease and recognizing that the diagnosis and treatment of alcoholism are medicine’s responsibility.
While abstinence-based programs would become widespread throughout the United States, treatment in the late 1970s would focus on all chemicals, not just alcohol. The word “alcoholism” was gradually replaced by “chemical dependency.” There would be a resurgence of interest in attending to the family, spouses, partners, and children of addicted persons. There also would be heightened interest in both young and adult children of alcoholics.
The role of the private sector in addiction treatment has lessened, with community-based programs taking on more responsibility. Today’s recovery programs treat addictive disorders, recognizing cross addictions and the need to abstain from all mind-changing chemicals. Clients are often for multiple addictive disorders, such as gambling, chemical dependency, eating and sexual disorders, and dual diagnoses, most commonly PTSD and affective disorders.
Addiction is a complex, devastating, terminal disease, yet it’s a treatable disease today. History has left us a long and painful legacy of addiction. Today we’re beginning a new legacy, the reality of recovery.