[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] my1stSmartPhone:
Being unfamiliar with Android, the 2 links took a number of visits to digest. Here are my notes in following the 2 discussions.

1st link: How To Extract Stock Recovery.img From an android

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I only followed this link until the 4th page, as most of it seemed to apply to other models. Because of the many references to the directory structure on the smartphone, I ended up using adb to explore the directory stucture on the phone. For anyone else who may follow in my naive footsteps for the Moto G (1st generation):

* For those unfamiliar with command line shells, for any of this to

work, you need to ensure that the directory containing adb.exe is

in your environment variable PATH (this is googlable)

* Since I was playing around and exploring, I also ensured that PATH

contained the directories in which fastboot & mfastboot resided.

This was not necessary for exploration described here.

* I then had to enable Developer Mode by going into Settings, About

phone, then tapping Build number ten times.

* I then went into Settings, Developer options, and enabled USB

debugging.

* For some reason, I also had go into Settings, Developer Options,

and Revoke USB debugging authorization

* After that, when I issued "adb devices" from the laptop, I and to

confirm authorization from the Moto G

* Note that if the Moto G required a password when powered up, I

needed to enter that before "adb devices" saw the Moto G.

* That "adb devices" command was issued at the command line on the PC

to which the Moto G was connected

* I did not need to be on an account with Administrator privileges

in order to use adb

* This 1st link suggested the existence of /proc/bml, /proc/mtd,

/dev/bml, and /dev/mtd. I found none of these on my Moto G.

* References are made to /proc/dumchar_info and /proc/emmc (albeit

for an "MTK Phone"), and my phone seems to contain neither

* Mention was made of SP Flash tool, but I'm making a conscious

decision to stick with mainstream tools

* CWM for sure, but the whole challenge right now is to back

up the OEM recovery before installing CWM

* Whatever the means of backing up the OEM's recovery, root cannot be

a prerequisite, since the point is to backup the whole phone as-is

before messing around, i.e., backing up the OEM recovery before

installing CWM, using it to back up the rest of the phone before

anything else like rooting, etc.

* Frankly, I don't plan to install much else, nor root unnecessarily

* From

http://www.theandroidhow.com/2014/06/how-to-dump-backup-any-android-rom.html,

the prospects of backing up the OEM's recovery without rooting

seems low

2nd link: [EASIEST WAY ROM DUMP] ROM dumping method for any phone

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* I initially entertained the idea of treating the Romdump mentioned

in the 2nd link as mainstream, but a google doesn't reveal any hits

for that, so it's not

* The top of the thread says "Need ROOT access", though it's not

clear whether the meaning is that root is needed for Romdump or

Romdump is needed because the person wants to back up the phone

before rooting

* The 1st post says that the su command is needed, which implies

that whatever was meant in the 1st bullet, root is needed to use

Romdump

* The 2nd post asks how Romdump can create a reliable image when CWM

requires that the OS must not be running (probably not referring to

backing up the OEM recovery). I could not find a clear and

compelling answer to the question of how the integrity could be

confirmed. One "answer" was to restore the backed up partition.

To me, this is not acceptable as you will be clobbering the content

of interest before confirming that it was properly backed up.

* I followed this thread at length, and several times, but it becomes

confusing after this and its relevance to my phone seems uncertain.

Due to the above 4 bullets, I decided not to spend the time needed

to more thoroughly vet this

It seems that backing up the OEM recovery without rooting may be a lost cause. I will go ahead and clobber it with CWM. Hopefully, that will work. Thanks for the help.