Albany, Oregon
Whitespires Presbyterian / Whitespires Berean Church

Organ by W. W. Kimball, 1906

Notes by Ken McKirdy.  June 3, 2006

The most recent chapter of the organ's story begins this past November of 
2005. I had been asked to play for a wedding at the church and was eager 
to do it not only because the bride and groom are friends of mine, but 
also because my high school choir performed in that church every December.  
I had always looked forward to accompanying the choir on that organ. 
However, I hadn't played it since December of my senior year, which was in 
1994. 

I arrived at the wedding rehearsal, pleased with myself for remembering 
where the key was hidden, and was surprised when a church board member 
directed me instead to a Kurzweil keyboard off to one side. I was told 
that the organ had not been operable in nearly a decade, and turning it 
on would result in 'a bunch of noise,' or a grand cipher. 

I played the keyboard for the wedding, and during the reception, I asked 
the board member why steps hadn't been taken to either keep the organ in 
good repair, or -- failing that -- why the organ hadn't been repaired. He 
replied that three or four different people over recent years had come in 
with proposals ranging from replacing the console with something electrical 
to ripping out the entire organ and replacing it with a digital 
something-or-other! The church itself (built in 1891 by the first 
Presbyterians in the valley) is on the historic register, and in this 
town (which prides itself on its many historic edifices), to drastically 
alter the organ would be akin to historical homicide. So in the absence of 
any better ideas, they did nothing. 

Upon hearing this, I nominated myself chairman of the spontaneously created 
Save the Whitespires Organ Committee, and I decided to call Lanny Hochhalter, 
who is a member of our AGO chapter and maintains most of the organs I play 
around here. I explained to him the organ's plight, and also the church's 
plight -- only 45-ish members, no money to speak of, and yet here sits this 
organ. (The church has been a Berean Fundamentalist church since 1973.) 

I asked Lanny to tell me what the problem(s) might possibly be if I described 
them on the phone, so at least we would know with what we were dealing. 
Lanny did us one better, and paid a visit to the organ at no cost to the 
church. He determined that the leather was stiff -- not cracked -- and that 
the primary valves needed to be releathered in order for them to seal up when 
the blower was sending air. This stiffness (and total loss of pressure) was 
causing the grand cipher. 

In the course of all of this, the Whitespires board member (who by now had 
become a good friend), Oscar, mentioned that -- quite coincidentally -- the 
organ's 100th birthday was coming up, and he went into the musky archives 
from which he produced a copy of the printed program from the original 
dedication recital, dated May 9, 1906. This was most intriguing, and in our 
zeal, I wondered aloud, "what if we somehow managed to get the organ playable 
in time for its 100th birthday? We could even present the very same recital!" 

So another call was made to Lanny, asking him if the organ really HAD to be 
releathered in order to play. He initially responded in the affirmative, but 
emailed a few days later to say that there might be one hope: since the 
leather was only stiff, and not cracked, it might be possible to loosen it 
up. I jumped at this news. We painted a test solution of Methyl Ethyl 
Ketone and silicone leather conditioner on a couple valves, left them for 
a week, and then returned to see if they would begin to move as the 
corresponding keys were played. Indeed, there was a little motion! That 
led to a major project as I crawled all over the innards of the organ, 
painting the toxic solution on every bit of leather I could find. Some 
valves simply couldn't be reached without major dismantling of lead tubes 
and chests, which I wasn't willing to do. 

Within two weeks, the swell and pedal divisions came back to life, and were 
completely playable. The great remained stubborn, and by the middle of April, 
only the lower three octaves were mostly playable. The upper two octaves 
were (and are) hit-or-miss. Those are valves which lead tubing prevented 
me from reaching, I think. 

So, after many hours of painting on MEK and repeatedly massaging leather 
valves to coax them into movement, we had restored enough of them to create 
enough pressure to be able to play a recital. Acquiring all the music on the 
program wasn't easy; most of it is out of print, and not available anywhere. 
I called in favors in several parts of the country where people lived near 
various libraries and/or organists who had the music we needed. 
The local paper was very good to us in terms of marketing and publicity, 
so filling all 350 available seats in the church was not a problem. We 
raised nearly $3000 for the organ fund. 

Now it's time for some history of the organ itself: 

The church was built in 1891 by Presbyterians. This was the second church 
they built here; the first, in the 1870s, was located directly behind the 
location of the present building, and was the first piece of real estate 
in this country to be owned by the Presbyterian Church USA. 

When the current (1891) building was built, it was decided there would not 
be an organ. There is some evidence that the Quaker tradition of shape-note 
singing was somewhat prevalent here at the time. In 1902, however, someone 
introduced an old Estey reed organ into the building, and evidently the 
Presbyterians got a kick out of it. They began a fund-raising campaign and 
ultimately raised $3000 for the purchase of a pipe organ befitting the 
Presbyterian tradition; it was ordered from the Kimball company of Chicago. 
The total cost of building, delivery and installation was $2806.07, and 
was installed by Mr. Francis and Mr. Weary of Eiler's Piano House of 
Portland. To this very day, the organ stands exactly as it was installed 
by Messrs. Francis and Weary. 

Once the organ was installed, Carl Denton of Portland was invited down to 
play a dedication recital, the music for which he selected himself. Carl 
Denton was also the organist at a Methodist church in Portland, and was 
on the faculty of the University of Oregon's Portland campus. He brought 
with him baritone John Monteith, also of Portland, and there were five 
vocal numbers on the program. Denton also teamed up with Albany resident 
and soprano Mrs. G. Langdon to present one soprano aria.  In November, 
I went to the public library to look up issues of the newspaper from 
that week, and was interested to learn that over 400 people attended that 
inaugural recital. 

The church can still theoretically hold 400 people between the floor and 
the balcony, but more modern fire codes will only permit 50 people in the 
balcony due to there being only one set of stairs. 

In 1932, a subset of the Whitespires Presbyterians saw fit to go literally 
a block up the street and build another Presbyterian church. When completed, 
the congregation split and there would be two Presbyterian congregations 
in Albany for more nearly 40 years (an Austin organ was installed in the 
new church). Then, in 1971, PCUSA decided it wasn't proper to have two 
identical churches a block apart, and instructed the local Presbyterians 
to select one building, sell the other one, and combine forces. As the 
newer building was larger and of seemingly better design, it was decided 
that Whitespires would be sold. In 1973, the Berean Bible Fellowship 
bought the building. Music is not a strong part of their liturgy, though 
(at least, not like it is in the Presbyterian church), and other than 
playing a few hymns on Sunday, playing of the organ decreased. 

Now, what's next for the organ? There has been a lot of conjecture about 
whether it should be restored or renovated with electro-pneumatics. Lanny 
is of the belief that the organ should be renovated; other organ 
technicians feel it should be restored without question. Restoration 
certainly fits the model of this town's way of thinking with regard to 
historic things. Both will cost an awful lot of money. 

The plan now is to keep playing the organ as much as possible, to try and 
keep the leather moving. The MEK we've put on the leather has weakened it, 
and it wouldn't surprise me if most of it gives out over this next winter. 
I would like to at least see the primary valves releathered; one generous 
builder in Connecticut has offered to re-leather them for only the cost 
of the leather. I haven't yet convinced the church to go ahead with this; 
they're nervous about shipping the chests to Connecticut from Oregon, 
because if they get lost in transit, they're gone for good, no matter how 
much insurance we might put on them. 

So, that's the story of the Kimball. 

One thing I do know -- this appears to be the only tubular pneumatic organ 
on the west coast, still extant! If there are more, our exhaustive searching 
hasn't turned them up.

[Notes edited from private e-mail received June 3, 2006.  JHCook, Database Manager.]