Pipe Organ Database

Updated through online information from John McCraney. -- The case is freestanding at the center front of the room behind the choir. The sides are either dark-stained mahogany or walnut. The front is a stenciled pipe fence almost to the ceiling with the "M" shape, a semi-circular large pipe "tower" at each end.

Beneath the center pipes between the towers are a number of small equally-sized Roman-arched opening containing small dummy pipes.

When some structural work was going on in the 1990s, I noticed some "stove pipe/tomato can" cylinders. If memory serves, they would have been about the diameter of the "tower" pipes, with none any longer than one or two yards.

They were stenciled, but covered with grime. I did not disturb them, but I have the impression they had once been placed on a frame so as to make an inverted "V" behind the center front case pipes as they became smaller in the middle. This arrangement can sometimes be seen in Victorian pipe fronts. They perhaps had been placed in storage when the Austin was installed.

The console is below the pulpit platform in front of the choir and to the far left as one faces the organ. This church is quite handsome with superb stained glass windows.

The following is from the organ rededication program after it was renovated in 1994. It differs in some respects from Mr. Playford' account (his stoplist nomenclature matches except for the number of ranks, but the program does not indicate how many pipes are in each rank), but I suspect he is correct, as I can find no mention of a Hook and Hastings either from the Atlanta Exhibition of 1895 or St. James in the Hook & Hastings opus list. The program states 17 ranks, with 999 pipes.

From the program in 1994: "The Atlanta Exposition . . . 1895 had on exhibit a magnificent pipe organ which attracted the interest of a group from St. James. The price was $ 3,000. The women of the church raised the necessary funds. . . . [The organ] was subsequently installed in the gallery of the church.

In 1909 a number of changes were made at St. James as the educational building was renovated and the sanctuary redecorated along with the interior of the organ being rebuilt and a new motor installed. [This is probably when the gallery was removed and the choir placed behind the pulpit.] In June, 1950, the church replaced the Hook and Hastings organ with a magnificent Austin, 2-Manual with pedals electric powered pipe organ at a cost of $10, 545.25. The beautifully toned pipes from the old Hook and Hastings organ were retained in this new installation."

Updated through online information from Louis Playford. -- Case and most of the pipework from the previous John Brown instrument.

According to information received from Louis Playford, the organ includes the case from the previous church organ -- attributed to John Brown of Wilmington, Delaware.

Identified through information on the Austin Organs, Inc. web site, accessed December 16, 2004