An Ebenezer of Metal, Leather and Wood

Bill Haskell in his Philadelphia shop, 1900

The “war to end all wars” had just come to a close. Around the world, soldiers had begun returning to their home towns. Eight million of their brothers and sisters in arms were left to rest beneath the European soil. The conflict had been long and difficult, and only with the arrival of John Pershing and his American troops in the summer of 1918 did the tide of battle significantly turn.

Six months later, it was over. In our own country, communities looked for ways to make sense of the struggle, to honor the Americans who served to bring it to a swift conclusion, and to remember those whose lives were lost in the new horrors of 20^th Century warfare.

In December of 1918, a small Episcopal parish on a hilltop in Oaks, PA, contracted an organbuilder named Bill Haskell, to build “a Pipe Organ of rare merit” to replace the small pump organ that stood in the chancel. Haskell had built instruments in his native Philadelphia with his father, Charles, for a decade or so before the turn of the century, patenting several innovations during that time. In 1901, the Haskell firm was purchased, along with Bill’s patents, by the Estey Organ Company of Brattleboro, Vermont, and Bill was offered the position of Superintendent, which he accepted.

The Estey instrument which Bill Haskell designed for our parish was indeed “of rare merit.” Faced with the challenge of a small pipe chamber, Haskell utilized many of his own patented solutions for creating larger sound with smaller pipes. Saint Paul’s parish had $78.00 cash on hand. The Estey Company priced the organ at $600.00. No one even blinked.

Instead, they signed the contract. A month later at the Vestry meeting of January 24, 1919, they recorded the reason for their resolve in the minutes of their assembly:

The Vestry, having been advised that the Organ Committee has purchased and installed a Pipe Organ of rare merit in the Church as a memorial to the men and women of the Church and Community who have rendered National Service in the recent War, it is hereby resolved that the Vestry heartily records itself as being in sympathy with the act...”

There it was. The vision of members of our parish, the genius of Philadelphian Bill Haskell and the skill of the Estey Organ Company of Vermont all combined to produce one thing, an instrument that would stand as an ebenezer, a visible, living remembrance of the men and women from our area who had served in the First World War, the war that didn’t end all wars, but should have. Each time it played, we would remember.

Half a century of heat, cold, moist air and dry took its toll on our Bill Haskell Estey. By the 1970s, the instrument needed typical repair, and the parish stepped up to the plate. Haskell’s pipework was slightly augmented, set on new chests from Mangam Organ Company in Philadelphia and coupled to a new solid-state console from OSI of Erie, PA. It’s those components, the Mangam chests and the OSI console, which began to fail in typical ways after thirty years of service in 2002. It was those early-warning signs that started us on the road to our current project of restoration and expansion.

The State of the Project

The current organ project has several goals:

C Replace the 1972 OSI console with a custom console of the highest quality utilizing an easily repaired digital control system

C Replace the failing Mangam chests with new, handbuilt electro-pneumatic chests, allowing the pipework to speak freely and fully

C Redesign the layout of the chests in the chamber so that the organ addresses the room most effectively and with a full range of expression

C Clean, restore and revoice the original Bill Haskell pipework to like-new condition

C Augment the instrument’s pipework around the original Haskell pipes to produce a new instrument designed to fully support the wide varitey of hymnody and service music sung by the congregation at St. Paul’s.

Right now, C. M. Walsh Pipe Organbuilders, Inc. of Philadelphia are five months into our project. In that time, the following milestones have been met:

1. The stoplist of the new instrument has been designed and agreed upon by myself and Colin Walsh

2. Schedule space has been reserved at Eastern Pipeworks, Hagerstown

3. Console and case materials have been agreed upon, ordered and received. Our instrument will use the finest quality walnut and mahogany, with contrasting trim in wood of the builder’s choice.

4. Drawknobs have been manufactured and the engraving order has been placed

5. Keyboards and pistons have been manufactured

6. Chest components have been manufactured. The chests are the wooden boxes on which the pipework sits. They house the “action” of the organ, the part that releases wind to specific pipes in response to commands from the keyboard.

7. The wind reservoirs of the instrument have been framed.

Our instrument is scheduled for completion prior to Christmas of this year. That being said, Walsh Organs are well on schedule. Once the console begins to come together, the photos on the bulletin board will start looking more recognizable, but remember, the organ itself is the pipework that hides in the chamber. Everything else is simply an interface between the organist and the instrument.

One thing is certain: The project that we’ve embarked upon at the beginning of the 21^st Century is no less bold than that undertaken by the souls who met in November of 1918 with $78.00 in their hands, seeking to remember their war dead with an instrument that would preserve their memory for generations. The “new” organ will be founded on the organ that they purchased, on the work of Bill Haskell, and, as fits our purpose, will truly be an instrument “of rare merit.” With God’s help, the children of the next century will look back on what we do now and will find their own inspiration to let dreams lead to vision, vision to hope and hope to reality.

In His Service,

- Mike Monaghan

Director of Music Ministry