- ATIN - 03/09/09 - A giant of the addiction treatment industry, one of a group of charismatic early founders who developed and built the nation's essentially 12-Step-based system of treatment centers, passed this morning.

Father Martin, known by millions who have gone through treatment who saw his ubiquitous "Chalk Talk" video lectures, passed at the age of 84. Father Martin was also one of the principal founders of Father Martin's Ashley, one of the old line private centers - Hazelden, Caron, Betty Ford - that are considered the most prestigious non-profit centers and that still dominate the agenda at organizations such as National Assocaition of Addiction Treatment Providers.

Father Martin's Ashley has recently gone through a major leadership change, as the baton was passed to a well known treatment executive, Father Mark Hushen, from the former CEO Leonard Dahl who built Father Martin's hand-in-hand with Father Martin himself.

"Our phones are ringing off the hook here," Hushen told Addiction Treatment Industry Newswire, ATIN, adding that there has been "a tremendous outporing of love" upon the treatment icon's passing.

Father Mark, as Hushen is known, believes that Father Martin's greatest legacy will be that, though the Chalk Talk videos and thousands of personal apprearances, he made the complex subject of addiction understandable.

And, having been among the earliest pioneer addiction activists, Hushen pointed out that, using humor and enormous eloquency, Father Martin was among those who took the subject of addiction out of the dark and into the light, helping lift taboos on the discussion of addiction in the public forum.

Newswire Staff

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