Note: Not extant. Not playable. (in this location)
2004-10-30 - Burned with building 1971. -Database Manager
2010-12-06 - Posted to OHS_Members_List December 5, 2010 by Barbara Owen: -- Unused for many years, burned with building January 1971. Before the fire, this was the only known extant organ built by Elmore Smith of New Haven, active in the 1870s. -Database Manager
2010-12-07 - Posted to OHS_Members_list December 6, 2010 by Scot Huntington: -- I talked with Richard Hamar last night, who saw the organ with Alan Laufman around 1969-1970. ... At the time of the visit, the church was part of a three-building grouping on what had once been a small town green, at the time of the visit consisting of a large colonial house, one-room school, and the small church (RH called it a "chapel"). The cluster had recently been purchased by a noted local real estate developer with preservationist sympathies, who having restored the house was slowly restoring the two out buildings in his spare time with hopes of turning them into an historical preservation enclave. The church was originally Congregational, but had not been a functioning church for at least 20 years. The developer bought the church from a collector of sorts, and the building housed a melodeon and several reed organs in addition to the Smith- original locations unknown for all.<br><br>Richard remembers the organ has being painted dark gray, perhaps not its original color, with three flats of gilded half-round wooden dummies. His remembrance of the stoplist is of an instrument considerably smaller than Barbara's notes indicate- 2 ranks, Stop Diapason and Principal. This memory is linked to his assertion that it was stylistically almost identical to the 2-stop William Gardner organ he owns, and he believes the two worked together in New Haven. However, his description of the case and its general dimensions could well indicate an organ of the size Barbara's card file indicates. It was a C-compass organ, and based on details of construction and types of screws used, he and Alan attributed its date to ca. 1850. It had a nameplate reading "Elmore Smith New Haven".<BR><BR>At the time of the fire, Alan was in negotiation to buy the organ in order to relocate it to a place where it would see regular use. The cause of the blaze which destroyed both church and school was attributed to arson and all that remains today is a large grassy clearing next to the house. -Database Manager
2010-12-07 - Posted to OHS_Members_List December 6, 2010 by Barbara Owen: -- "That card file entry was made circa 1956-58, when I was living not far away in Portland, CT (where I was organist of the Congregational church) and doing some organ crawling in the area. I did see that organ, and remember it standing in the gallery and having a rather simple 3-sectional case such as Richard described. It was not playable, and I can't recall whether the building was still being used as a church at the time. I may even have taken a picture of it, but it will take some searching to find it. I don't think I would have recorded it as having 5 stops if I hadn't actually observed that (or seen 5 knobs anyway), but maybe one of them was divided. ... I also can't remember where I got the "c1875" date. There seem to have been several Smiths in the New Haven area both building and playing organs -- and nobody's done any real research on them." -Database Manager
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