Is Thunderbird sending crash reports to Mozilla? If so what are the crash Id's so we can look up the relevant crash and hopefully work out something useful

See https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/mozilla-crash-reporter

Here is the most recent ID-- http://crash-stats.mozilla.com/report/index/bp-9cf8f1f0-4e01-40a1-b42b-3e5532140311

I am not sure this will help, but it will not hurt. The type of violation I see is usually caused by corrupt executable components, so try reinstalling Thunderbird. Don't uninstall anything, just install it again.

reinstalled TBird but problem still exists. Here's lastest, post reinstall, crash report ID-- http://crash-stats.mozilla.com/report/index/bp-e892d460-99e8-43d4-b172-311672140312

edited 3/15 to add: as I stated, trying to open address book still crashed Tbird despite the suggested reinstall of Tbird. Any other suggestions?

edited 3/27/14 to add: still have the problem and have not heard another word re a solution. Isn't there anyone out there who can suggest a fix for this problem???

open the profile folder.

Help menu > troubleshooting information click the show profile folder button.

Close Thunderbird.

Rename abook.mab and history.mab to abook.old and history.old

Those are the address book and collected addresses respectively. Restart Thunderbird and the files will be recreated, hopefully with out the error.

Thanks very much for the suggestion, but it didn't work. In addition to the abook.mab file I have 6 labeled abook-1.mab, etc. Presumably these correspond to the 6 address books that I have, so I also changed these names to .old, along with the history file. Restarted and found the all the .mab files had been recreated as you said, but when I clicked the Address Book button, same result, error.

What's bugging me is that Tbird is obviously accessing the Address Book since when I start to enter an email address, say Janedoe@xxxxx, it shows me a drop down of the j's, then ja's, etc as I type the name. So the address books are reachable except when I click on the button to do so directly. Thus I can't add, delete, or change entries there. I don't pretend to understand how these things work, but it's maddening.

Two issues perhaps.

One, if that still works after renaming the mab files your obviously using the MAC address book (read only) or an Ldap server

Two have you tried restarting from the help menu with add-ons disabled.

Finally (clutching a straws)

Create a new profile http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_manager#Mac_OS_X

That is not going to be a "cure" but it will indicate if it is something with the profile, or the environment

Making progress!! Restarting w/ add-ons disabled did the trick. Access to Address Book in this mode goes off without a hitch. Do not have time this evening, but tomorrow will try disabling add-ons one at a time to try to find the offender(s).

One question--When I restart w/o add-ons, is there a way to re-enable them while Tbird is open, or at least without restarting the machine?

Thank you so much for your time and ideas. Will report here tomorrow about IDing the offender.

Thunderbird with add-ons disable offers the menu to disable all permanently when it starts. use that and then restart TB normally and re-enable one at a time. Modern Add-ons, or those without binary components will not require a restart of Thunderbird. Those with binary component, or those not using the new restart-less architecture will require Thunderbird to be restarted.

At least you can put all those mab files back now.

The problem appears to be Reminder Fox. The other add-ons I have are Adblock Plus, Extra Folder Columns, Test Pilot for Tbird and View About. Disabling just Reminder gave me back direct access to the Address Books; toggling others off and on had no effect.

I guess the question now is why. I assume that it there must be something odd about my set up and its interaction with Reminder, or more people would be having this problem. Although I'm content to operate without Reminder, if someone wants to work with me to identify the specific source of the problem, I'm game to do it, but it's not something I'm capable of doing on my own.

Thanks again very much for your help. What a relief to have the Address Books back!

Your can remove Test pilot permanently. It will never be used now.

You could use lightning and have a full calendar as well at todo lists. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/lightning/ with over a million uses it is fairly popular.

You could post a request on the reminder fox support forum https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/reminderfox

or you could email the developers. http://www.reminderfox.org/developers/

Personally I prefer Lightning for Thunderbird. Reminderfox is good in the browser. But it is just personal preference.

I'll contact the Reminder Fox developers and see where it goes from there and will also take a look at Lightning. Thanks for the suggestions, and once again, for your help.