Note: Not extant. Not playable. (in this location)
2023-01-30 - As reported in the *Semi-Weekly Spectator* (Hamilton, May 21, 1856): "New organ -- we inadvertently omitted to notice a new organ, manufactured in this city some time since, by Messrs. White & Hagar, for the Wesleyan Methodist Church, London, which we now learn has been erected in its place, and was performed on for the first time on Sunday last. We are given to understand that it is a splendid instrument, and reflects the highest credit on the builders. The London *Free Press*, speaking of the organ, says: 'It cost £600, and is considered to be the best organ in Canada. A few descriptive particulars may prove interesting. It is built in the Gothic style, is 27 feet high, 16 feet wide and 11 feet deep. It has two full setts [sic] of keys, a great organ, swell organ and pedal organ with gilt front speaking pipes. There are four composition pedals to draw in and out all the powerful stops. Among the fine stops in the swell organ we would particularly mention the 'salicional', concert-flute and hautboy. In the great organ we observed that the trumpet extends throughout and has a very powerful effect, especially when used in connection with the pedal pipes. A novel feature in the organ is, that it possesses a stop termed the flute traverse, of peculiar construction and is a successful imitation of the German flute.'" -Andrew Henderson
2023-01-30 - According to the website of Metropolitan United Church, London: "As the congregation grew, larger churches were built, in 1839 and 1842. In 1854, North Street (later Queens Avenue) Methodist Church, thought to be the largest west of St. James in Montreal, was built on the corner of North (now Queens Avenue) and Clarence streets. It has been frequently named the parent church of Methodism in London and was responsible for many mission churches which have long since become self-supporting. Tragically in the early morning of February 2, 1895, fire broke out, and burned the church to the ground. Undaunted, the Board of Trustees made plans for a new church on Wellington Street. Samuel McBride, who had been a trustee when the North Street Methodist Church was built, agreed to oversee the construction, even though he was 76 years old. During the process, he presided over 96 of the 99 planning meetings. The church was built in the Romanesque Revival style on a foundation 184 by 96 feet with a bell tower rising 170 feet. It seated nearly 1,400 worshippers, though the congregation was then half that size. The cost of the site, the building, the furnishings and the organ came to just over $97,000, a substantial sum even for what was then the wealthiest Methodist church in London. The name was then changed to First Methodist Church and the cornerstone laid in July of that same year. The Free Press called it "Methodism's Magnificent Temple". On June 10, 1925, the United Church of Canada was born and the name again changed to its present name, Metropolitan United Church." -Andrew Henderson
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