Dedications – DreamersAndGiants.com

Stories Behind the Soaring Sound

I have enjoyed it hundreds, if not thousands, of times at Concerts, Convocations, Recitals, Weddings and Worship Services.

But I confess that I haven’t really stopped to find out more about it until now.

The organ in Wesley Chapel has been a major player in many stories.

Dedication
Celebration
Meditation
Inaguration

The music played on this organ has

Lifted our spirits
Comforted our souls
Given great enjoyment and inspiration

The organ in Wesley Chapel was built by the Casavant Freres Organ Builders. That company was founded in Quebec, Canada in 1879 by two brothers, Claver and Samuel Casavant, who shared a love of the craft of organ building. They traveled extensively throughout Europe studying organs and those who built them. Their organs are thought to be among the finest in the world.

When President Stanley H. Martin was working on plans for Wesley Chapel, he drew heavily from his experience at Boston University. He taught there, and was the first chaplain at Marsh Chapel when it was built in 1950. Sure enough, the organ in that building is also built by the Casavant Freres Organ Builders.

Installation Dates and Delays

Some delays due to a labor strike in England apparently prevented the organ from being ready for the October 29, 1967 Chapel Dedication ceremony. The program does not mention this, so the programs must have already been printed prior to this story in the Pharos on October 24.

Clear back on page three was this brief notice:

By January 23, 1968 the headlines said:

The print is small, so I will transcribe it here:

Installation of Wesley Chapel’s organ begins today, according to Chaplain Sydney Davis. Chapel services for this morning have been cancelled, but services will beheld as usual next week.

The $130,000 organ and Sculmerich chimes were donated by local persons who prefer to remain anonymous.

Installation and tuning of pipes for the organ will continue for approximately six weeks, and dedication of the organ will take place March 3 in the first of a series of organ recitals to be given this semester.

Richard Ellsasser is best noted for having memorized the complete works of Bach at age 19. He is the second person to have done so.

Elsasser maintains offices in the midwest, Hollywood and New York.

Installation, originally scheduled for completion early last semester, was held up by a delay in shipment of a metal screen to be put in front of the 4,174 pipes of the organ.

The screen, made in England, was held up due to a strike and was not shipped until last month.

Casavante Freres of Toronto, Canada, makers of the organ, are in charge of installation of the organ and pipes.

The screen had to be installed prior to the pipes which have been available since last semester. In order to install the screen, workmen had to work behind the screen in the area in which the pipes are to be put.

Contractors were afraid that in the process of screen installation, pipes might be damaged, so the decision was made to install the screen first.

Following pipe installation, pipes must be tuned or “voiced.” This procedure will take approximately five weeks.

“We hope to be able to use the organ within six weeks,” Robert Shafer, official college organist, said.

FOUR Dedication Concerts

This was so much excitement over the organ, that there was a series of concerts to dedicate it. They began with a well-known organ prodigy, followed by a faculty concert, an alumni concert, and ended with a well-known organ performer and teacher. Click here to see the full program for the March 3rd Concert.

March 3, 1968 (3:00 pm) by Richard Ellasser.
March 19, 1968 (8:15 pm) by Dr.Robert E. Shafer
March 31, 1968 (3:00 pm) by Dwight Menard (1964)
November 19, 1968 (8:00 pm) by Dr. George Markey (Princeton)

Mystery Solved. Thank you, G.I. Rohrbough!

The January 1966 edition of the West Virginia Wesleyan College Bulletin reported that :

The organ, to be built at a cost of $92,900, has been contributed to the College by a donor wishing to remain anonymous for the present. The installation of the Casavant organ will permit Wesleyan a great opportunity to provide outstanding concerts for all of central West Virginia.

It did not remain anonymous, however.

Etta Maude Lynch was born in 1875, and died in 1936. This photograph of her was located on Find-a-Grave 130768195. This was way before we had a yearbook from which to locate a photograph. Irwin’s yearbook information in the 1923 Murmurmontis shows that he was a very active part of the college community.

Irwin went on to be a very successful educator and administrator, serving as president of multiple colleges. You can read more about him here. He also served on the West Virginia Wesleyan Board of Trustees from 1967-76, and through his gift of the organ in Wesley Chapel, he is still contributing to events at the school. In 1940 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Pedagogy degree.

Inspiration and Appreciation

The 4,174 pipes, 54 stops, and 75 real ranks of pipes involved have attracted world-famous organists to come and play in Wesley Chapel. Wesleyan Giants such as Robert E. Shafer, Bobby Loftis, J. Peter Berkovitz, Marguerite Bostonia, and Melody Meadows have played it and inspired their students – many of whom have become master organists in their own rights. Among them are Peter DuBois, Jessica Scott, Brett Miller, Zachary Allen, Abby Woods Haake, Peter Infanger, Greg Blair, Alfred Kanagaraj, Edward Byram, and Kayoko Funada, but there are many many more.

Other notable people include Eunyoung Kim, a Fulbright, and Pamela Balch, President of WVWC from 2006-16.

And thousands of us have benefited from the music resulting from this gift.

A May to Remember

What a week that must have been!

Baccalaureate, Commencement, Dedications, Banquets, Receptions, Reunions, Trustee and Alumni Council Meetings and more. Kind of like Homecoming, Commencement, and Annual Conference all rolled together. But, then, all of these things were very interconnected. Many of the same people were involved, so it must have sounded like a great idea to do it in this way.

Each of these events had one or more Bishops in attendance, and each of these Bishops were world leaders.

May 26, 1953 was the 63rd Annual Commencement – with Bishop Corson as the main speaker.
May 27, 1953 was the dedication of the Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library – which included Bishops Corson, Straughn, and Wicke.
May 27-31, 1953 the West Virginia Annual Conference of the Methodist Church met on campus. – Bishop Wicke presiding
May 28, 1953 was the dedication of the Methodist Union Plaque in the Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library -Bishop Straughn speaking. Read more about this here.

Library Dedication

Since this event happened exactly 66 years today, and since it included all three of these bishops, I would like to highlight this great event out of all of the others that happened that weekend. And to top it off, there is a major remodeling of the building happening right now that will honor all of these things into our future. I think they would be pleased!

We have priceless recording (32:21) of this event. Click on the link below to listen to it. It is well worth downloading and listening. Dedication of Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library

It is worth the half an hour or so because not only will you hear the actual voices of these great men, you will even hear a very familiar train whistle making several appearances! It sounds just exactly the same…close your eyes and you can be transported to 1953.

I have transcribed the prayer from that recording, and have included a transcript of the Dedicatory Address by Bishop Corson. The litany and full program can be found here.

Bishop Straughn gave the opening prayer:

Let us unite in prayer.

In this moment, our Father, of dedication of brick and mortar – of stone and wood and iron and steel – we dedicate more than a structure or a building in which certain things may be learned and discovered.

We are building into ideas. We are searching after truth. We are trying to discover the ways of life for the world that is, the directions for the world to be.

And here we shall discover much. Much that godly men and women have put down in books and on paper telling us what they have discovered and what they have found. What they know about Thee. What Thou hast told them.

We are seeking after eternal truth leading unto eternal life.

Here, perhaps, we shall find the way from having discovered the way of life through the mind as well as through the heart. We shall pursue after the things which we may have discovered, and shall not lose the way in our pilgrimage through this world.

And yet, we know there is so much that has not yet been put down. Yet waiting to be told to us. Waiting for minds and hearts receptive under Thy leading and direction. Minds and wills and hearts that shall become obedient, and a new truth that Thou shalt speak unto them who are the youth of this day – and the rest of us who still want to know.

And, believing that there is so much yet to be known. So much yet to be found out, but each for himself. Remembering as we do what one of Thy blessed disciples put down in the good book, that there were so many other things that Jesus did which are NOT written in the book, but which if they had been recorded and told that not even the world itself should be able to hold the books in which those things might be written.

Help us, then, that on the basis of what we know, that we may face up to the things that we do not know and are yet to discover. Grateful for leading and for guidance.

So we bless the day when a dear woman looked this way and sent to this blessed institution something of the gains of life that could be put into structure and form, and to make these things possible. God bless her memory unto us this day, and may the fine sweet spirit of that dear woman be maintained alive and alert on this campus for the guidance and inspiration of the boys and girls who here may be seeking the way of truth and the light.

Bless us, then, this afternoon. We give Thee our praise and we give Thee our thanks. In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Corson, Bishop Fred Pierce — Bishop Fred Pierce Corson

Click here for a full transcript of this wonderful Dedicatory Address.

The Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library is still actively fulfilling the purposes that he mentioned 66 years ago.

Those with inquiring, developing, responsible, and open minds still use the collections – although they are now in many formats not dreamed of in 1953. They still use the place to contemplate and discuss ideas, and learn to use those open minds to go out and create a better world.

Yes, May 1953 was certainly a May to remember.

Just Passing Through?

As we hurry along our busy way, we seldom stop to look left and right at fixtures along our path, but even many of the pillars and gates that we walk through have stories. Here are a few examples.

The Atkinson Gateway

On the left side of the photo below, you can see a brick pillar. This sign, a familiar sight to the students in the 1970s, looks quite strange to those who walk the campus today. It would also have looked quite strange to those from earlier years. It is interesting to see a place through the eyes of other times.

Corner of College Avenue and Meade Street 1975

Corner of College Avenue and Meade Street 2018

When zooming in even closer, we see that the inner pillars have a sign on them indicating that they were erected by George W. Atkinson in honor of the Normal Class of 1913.

The class had honored him by choosing his name for their own, and the feeling was evidently mutual.

This is, by the way, the same George W. Atkinson for whom Atkinson Chapel was named in 1922.

College Avenue Gate Near McCuskey Hall

Another interesting set of pillars is at the end of Main Street as it intersects College Avenue. This set has no official name that I am aware of, but it did have a very specific purpose……to keep motorcars from running onto the campus in 1921. This had apparently become somewhat of a problem, and a chain was attached to the pillars – you can still see where the chain was attached.

Gates to Ross Field

As you approach the turnstile gates to enter Cebe Ross Memorial Field, there are two brick ticket booths. These each have signs and pillars off to the side which are full of history. Built from bricks that were saved when the Old Gym was razed in 1974, they each bear informational signage as well.

As we pass through pillars and gates, and as we pass through our lives, we would do well to notice the things Which Give us insight into the rich heritage all around us. If Walls Might Speak!

Buildings That Build

Buildings. We pass by them every day.

We enter them without a thought that they might not always have been there.

First we build our buildings, and then they build us.

Bishop Frederick P. Corson echoed Churchill’s words on May 27, 1953 at the dedication ceremony of the Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library . His remarks cover a wide range of things that are relevant for today, and I would encourage you to take a look at what he had to say about such things as Liberal Arts, education and democracy, the great success and growth of WVWC, and more.

Building the Buildings

The buildings themselves provide the space for us to learn, live, grow, and share as a community. But buildings do not just appear by magic. They take a lot of planning and fundraising. Then they take a lot of detailed work by architects. Then, the hard work and sweat of those who build them. It takes time, effort, and resources to build buildings.

Construction of Fleming 1952 — Fleming 1952 (photo by Howard Hiner)

Construction 1963 Campus Center — Benedum Campus Community Center, 1963 (photo by Howard Hiner)

Chapel Steeple 1967 – Photo by Howard Hiner

Construction 2008 September Reemsnyder — Reemsnyder September 2008 – Looking from the parking lot toward the back of the library (photo by Allison Hull)

Working in the Buildings

People work in them once they are finished. There are those who work hard to maintain and clean them. People who do the painting, fix the windows, keep the air conditioning and heat at the proper levels. People who are locksmiths, carpenters, groundskeepers, and who make sure that the physical environment is clean, comfortable, and safe. It takes time, effort, and resources to maintain our buildings.

The more buildings there are, the bigger job this becomes!

On this Labor Day 2018, I especially salute all of these hard workers. Many I know by name because I have been in the buildings where they work. Others I do not know, but your work makes everything else possible.

Labor Day Graphic — Thanks for all you do!!!

Buildings Build Us

At a college, there are those who teach in them and those who learn. Through this process people are built just as surely as the physical brick and mortar building is built. It takes time, effort, and resources to build our students.

The Lynch-Raine Administration Building builds Business Leaders, Communicators, and Educators.
The English Annex builds writers and those who love literature.
Haymond builds historians, political scientists, and those who focus on issues such as Gender Studies and Social Justice. It used to build scientists, but Christopher and Reemsnyder do that now.
The Library provides resources and a space for learners to interact with all of the wisdom of the ages (and their own thoughts).
Loar builds musicians.
The Martin Religious Center, connected to Wesley Chapel, builds people who think deeply and who tend to spiritual matters. Our founders would be especially proud to know of Bishops Peter Weaver (1966) and Thomas Bickerton (1980), and several others who have become leaders in the United Methodist denomination.
Middleton builds Nurses.
John D. Rockefeller, IV Physical Education Center builds Excercise Scientists and Athletic Trainers.

The original building on campus is shown here with the student body in 1892. Included in that group of students would be Thomas W. Haught and several others who became trustees and faculty and administrators in later years. They helped to guide and build the school, and wrote the histories so that we would be able to know more about our heritage.

Class at Harmer Gateway 2018 — WVWC Class of 2022

This group (Class of 2022) is studying The Legacy of Dreamers and Giants (WVWC History) this fall. They will be learning about all of our buildings, those who built them, and those who have been built within the walls.

And the building goes on.

Tag: Dedications