2004-10-30 - Status Note: There 1991. -Database Manager
2004-10-30 - Built for Meeting House in Winchester. Moved to library in 1903. Restored by Stuart [T 35:1 says Richard Hedgebeth] in 1976, 1-5. -Database Manager
2025-04-07 - The instrument is a high-style city organ, with an elegant secretary-type case of walnut and bird's eye maple inlay around the keydesk with a gathered cloth screen in a clutch-sunburst pattern. The cloth frame and center post is original, but the metal clutch raises a question of authenticity The present synthetic screen material in olive green is amateurish in treatment and detracts from the organ's extremely elegant casework. The compass is GG-g3, 61 notes, with GG# and AA#, suggesting the organ may have been tuned in something other than meantone, either equal or well-tempered. The Stopt Diapason is divided into treble and bass @ middle-c (Diapason Bass, and a missing treble label). A large portion of the 29 stopt wood basses are Pratt--the only historic pipes still extant in this instrument. All the present metal pipes are new European supply-house replacements. The nameplate is brass and appears original. The organ is currently unplayable--full of ciphers, off-speech pipes, and sticking keys. Present pressure is 43 mm, perhaps too high, and the pitch is A430.8 with the organ in challenged condition. The organ and the companion Pratt church organ in the second floor museum within the Conant Library building were once used for public concerts, but a subsequent director after the organ's acquisition abandoned the practice, and the museum room became a dumping ground for artifacts, files, and broken furniture. The organs have been unused and neglected for at least 10 years and both are now completely unplayable. The large church organ may simply need a couple days of mechanical adjustment, but the severe ciphering of the chamber instrument is more worrisome, suggesting the possibility of cracks. The present administration is favorable to the museum and the valuable pipe organs therein, but now is faced with the state mandates regarding handicap access in an historic building that only has stairs and limited funds. Having future public concerts in this second-floor space is a problem without easy solutions. The excellent workmanship of the Pratt is the equal of Boston city organbuilding of the period. If the organ originally had metal pipes, this would make it a later organ than the two surviving church organs here and at Sturbridge, possibly as late as the 1830s. The treble terminus of g56 is also more common later than earlier. The casework follows high-style city practice and is much more sophisticated than the country vernacular one would expect from a remote early-nineteenth century location like Winchester. This suggests Pratt to have been a highly-skilled craftsman, well-traveled and acquainted with city taste and quality, and Winchester itself to have possibly been a country oasis of urban expectations and taste. The chromatic chest is very slightly wider than key scale and the bottom 8 notes are diatonic through a wood rollerboard. The chest is located about mid-calf with the single-fold diagonal bellows and diagonal feeder below. The action is a straight sticker from the key lever to the chest, otherwise known as a pin action. The pallets are glued in and are covered with a single layer of leather. The pallet springs are strong and the key dip is shallow. The feeder is pumped by the player with a heavy iron pedal. The bellows weights of both this organ and the companion church organ are new, making their present wind pressures open to question. The keyboard has ivory naturals and ebony sharps, and the rosewood stopknobs are on round shanks with flat-front ivory labels and script engraving. The natural-note key levers have a molded nosing. The case is structural. The Stopt Diapason treble is a chimney flute from middle-c with soldered caps. The middle-c Dulciana 8' is narrow-scale metal, and all the open metal pipes are cone tuned. The Principal 4' has a stopt wood bottom octave. -Scot Huntington
2025-04-07 - After traveling with his father to Hudson, NY were he helped install a new organ, a young Henry Pratt decided to try his hand at organbuilding, Capt. Sam Smith, a ship's captain who retired in Winchester, agreeing to pay $300 if the organ played. The organ was completed in 1799 and Smith gifted it to the Winchester Meeting House. When the Congregationalists built a new building the organ was given to the town who sold it to the Universalists in 1842, and it was repaired by Henry's son Julius, ca. 1850. By 1883 it is recorded the organ was in disrepair, and was given to the town in 1903 and moved into the library. It was restored by the Stuart Organ Co. (Richard Hedgebeth) in 1976 The organ is nearly identical to the church organ now in the Meeting House at Sturbridge Village. The pipes are all wood except for the top octave of the 12th and the top two octaves of the 15th. The organ is unenclosed and the cornice box and roof are new 1976. The organ is exceptionally well preserved. The double-rise wedge reservoir is fed by a single diagonal feeder, powered by foot or a vertical handle at the side of the organ. The feeder action is especially heavy to operate. The keyboard is new in 1976 and is not of historic design. The unlabeled stops, (brass drawer pulls) work backwards, i.e. in is on and out is off. There is an inoperative machine stop which should turn the 12 and 15 on and off. The stop list is 8 open, 8 stopt, and open 4, 3 and 2. The compass is GG, AA, BB-d51. The absence of GG# and AA# was typical for church organs tuned in meantone, and these notes are musically unusable. The case is thick mahogany veneer on pine, and figured mahogany in the keydesk. The keyboard pulls out to play and the hinged door opens to expose the keydesk. The facade comprises half-round wooden dummies, gilded (renewed 1976). The center section of the facade is removable for tuning. The 1976 restoration was conservative and historically respectful. The case is structural, i.e. the internal works do not have an independent framework. The pallet box as it the rear and the key tails engage a fan backfall extending to the back of the organ and the iron pulldowns extend through three linkage sections to the backfall. The bottom two octaves are diatonic with a wood rollerboard, and then the chest runs chromatic. The organ is unplayable, having no key dip as a result of being abandoned and neglected for over 10 years. The current administration is aware of the organ's great historical value (the nation's oldest non-Pennsylvania built American organ) and hopes to return it to service. The poor condition of the organ makes the pitch and pressure readings suspect, and the bellows weights are new in 1976: 30 mm w.p. and A433. The quality of construction, and of the many wood pipes in particular is extremely high, the equal of Boston organbuilding of the period. The tone of the ensemble is gentle and flutey. -Scot Huntington
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