Hickory Neck's "New" Antique Woodberry Tracker Organ
by Ed Godshall, Organist-Choir Master 

The organ which Ron Tindall and his associates are assembling in our new 
church was given to Hickory Neck last year by Old Donation Episcopal Church 
in Virginia Beach. It was taken apart and has been in climate controlled 
storage for over a year. The main portion of this organ was built in 1901 
by Jesse Woodberry for a Roman Catholic Church in New England. 

Born in England, Jesse Woodberry (1841-1922) was a pipe organ builder of some 
renown in the New England. For a time he built organs with his brother James 
Woodberry, also born in England. Jesse finally retired from organ building 
in 1910. 

Old Donation had the organ for over a decade. Its original home, the Roman 
Catholic Church in New England, apparently banished the organ to the church 
basement when they decided they no longer needed it. What could be salvaged 
was eventually obtained by the Organ Clearing House, a national organization 
which saves important historical pipe organs from buildings which are going 
to be torn down or from churches which don't want them anymore. The Organ 
Clearing House stored the remains of the Woodberry organ in Boston for 
ten years. 

When the organ was acquired by Old Donation in 1983, it required extensive 
rebuilding and repair. This work was carried out by Lawrence Trupiano and 
Henry Mann, organ builders of New York City, who have done much restoration 
for the Organ Clearing House and others. The cost in 1983 was $15,000. 

Many of the original pipes (over 600) had been lost or destroyed. Mann and 
Trupiano used pipes from other unrestorable old organs and had new ones built 
in order to meet the acoustical specifications of a well built pipe organ 
today. The present organ consists of 11 ranks of pipes with 13 stop knobs. 

There are two manuals (keyboards) and a flat (German style) pedal board 
(a set of notes to be played by the feet). The keyboards are have the usual
 number of keys for pipe organs today, namely 61. The pedal board is called 
short compass because it only has 29 notes. Most organs built in America 
today have 32 note pedal boards that are concave and radiating. 

A compact German electric blower was installed in order to provide wind, 
since the original bellows and pumping handle were no longer extant. A new 
case had to be built for the instrument because the original was lost 
somewhere along the way. Mann and Trupiano built one of poplar wood based 
on a case designed for the Presbyterian Church in Sag Harbor, Long Island, 
New York, in 1845 by the noted architect Minard Lafever (1798-1854). This 
wooden case is painted white and contains over twenty metal façade pipes 
which are displayed across the front of the instrument. These are similar 
to the ones in the historic Lafever case and they are purely decorative; 
that is, they do not make any sound. The pipes which make the sound are 
inside the case behind these facade pipes. 

The remaining parts of the original instrument contain pieces of many 
different kinds of wood: ebony, cherry, walnut, oak, maple, and mahogany. 
The natural keys on the keyboards are ivory from African elephant tusks;
 this ivory is over 150 years old. 

Many people whose names are well-known in organ building circles worked on 
the acquisition and installation of this instrument, among them are Alan 
Laufman, John K. Ogasapian, and William van Pelt. 

The current specification of the organ is: 
Great: 
   8' Stopped Diapason 
   4' Principal (metal pipes)
   Mixture III (metal) 

Swell (original off-center swell shoe): 
   8' Stopped Diapason (stopped wooden pipes)
   4' Pyramid Flute (metal gemshorn pipes)
   Fifteenth (2' Principal - metal pipes)
   Double draw stop for a 17th and a 19th 

Pedal 
   16' Bourdon (stopped wooden pipes - original to Woodberry instrument) 

Tremulant (adjustable) 

Couplers: Sw/Grt, Sw/Ped, Grt/Ped 
Bellows Signal (unused stop knob) 

Ron Tindall started setting the organ up in our new building the week of 
May 8. It is to be done in plenty of time for the consecration service 
on June 24.

[From the Hickory Neck Episcopal Church Newsletter.]