LITTLE ROCK — When Joe McQuany decided that he was going to get sober in 1962, he went to the "The Nut House," as he called it - more commonly known as the Arkansas State Hospital.
"Joe would say, 'White alcoholics went to a hospital, blacks went to 'The Nut House' and women went to jail,'" said his friend Billy DeLuca.
McQuany, founder and executive director of Serenity Park, a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center for men in Little Rock, died Thursday of complications from Parkinson's Disease.
He was 78.
In 1962, McQuany and other black alcoholics were admitted as mental patients to the State Hospital, now known as the Division of Behavioral Health Services, because they were not allowed to join treatment programs.
When McQuany finished treatment, he began attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, though there was some resistance from the white members in the program at the time.
"Joe was the first black man to get sober through the AA program in Little Rock," said DeLuca, Serenity Park administrator, who came to the center when battling alcoholism. "He wasn't a part of the socializing, and because he didn't have the support of the fellowship, he had to really dive into the Twelve Step program and really study the Big Book vigilantly."
McQuany began living by the principles of the Big Book - the AA book that detailsthe Twelve Steps to recovery and the philosophy of the program.
For McQuany, reaching out to alcoholics became a lifelong mission that he pursued even after his health declined.
"Although he suffered from Parkinson's and had been in bad health for several years," said his friend, Tucker Steinmetz, "he remained active in the leadership of the Park until about two weeks ago."
McQuany traveled the world, visiting rehabilitation centers and giving seminars on alcohol and substance abuse.
"On the top of each page of his Big Book, he logged where he had traveled to give a seminar," DeLuca said. "You'll turn one page and it might say San Diego. The next page might say Sacramento, and the next might literally say, Geneva, Switzerland."
"There were two missions in Joe's life," DeLuca said. "One was to carry the message of the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous and the other was to establish a treatment center."
McQuany wrote several books on Alcoholism and developed a recovery program based on the Alcoholics Anonymous method.
After he had been sober for a few years, McQuany began visiting the Pulaski County Penal Farm, "where drunks who were picked up were taken," DeLuca said. "He'd bring coffee, donuts and his Big Book."
By 1971, when the federal government gave money to the states for alcohol treatment programs, McQuany was known in Little Rock for his determination to put alcoholics on the road to recovery.
So with a $330 grant and donations, McQuany opened the original Serenity House in an old YMCA building that has since been torn down.
The center was later moved into an old house at 2500 Broadway St., and in 1990, moved to the Serenity Park Inc. campus at 2801 W. Roosevelt Road.
"I had $300 [when I started]," McQuany said in a March 2005 Arkansas Democrat-Gazette article, when Serenity Park was breaking ground on the women's facility. "People said, 'How are you gonna do it?' I said, 'I don't know,' and I stepped out. I've always stepped out into things, and people have always helped me."
Arkansas, Pages 26 on 10/28/2007