2021-04-19 - Information obtained from *Johnson Organs 1844-1898*, published 2015, and *The Johnson Organs* by John Van Varick Elsworth. In 1952, J.V.V. Elsworth obtained Op. 491, and recycled the pipework into an electric-action instrument he had installed in his home in Watertown, New York ca. 1955. Opus 491 was a 2-manual chamber organ built in 1877 for a residence in Lowville, N.Y. and later moved at an unknown date to a church in Pulaski, New York, a town on the edge of Lake Ontario and not far from Watertown. After Elsworth's death in 1971, his widow gifted the organ in 1974 to St. David's Episcopal Church in West Seneca, New York, a modern building somewhat contemporary with the relocation of the Elsworth instrument. The church website only has a photo of the organ console, but in other photos, small portions of the organ proper can be seen and it appears to be erected in an elevated free-standing case against the left wall of the chancel, and the organ console is installed in the area under the organ-- hardly an ideal arrangement for the organist. Counting stop tablets, the organ would appear to have between 11 and 14 sounding stops, and a full complement of unison and octave couplers. Elsworth was a life-long admirer of Johnson organs and wrote the first biography of the firm in 1955, published posthumously by the O.H.S. in 1984. While he only preserved the pipework of Op. 491, he did so zealously without alteration of any kind other than the installation of tuning slides. Elsworth was an engineer working for the railroad air-brake division of Westinghouse, and it is entirely possible with his knowledge and skills, that he may have built the organ himself using supply-house components, rather than hiring an organbuilder to do that for him. -Scot Huntington
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