Organ Restoration

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 St Paul’s is very fortunate to have a pipe organ built by the esteemed company Aeolian Skinner of Boston Massachusetts. Our instrument was designed by Joseph Whiteford, Who would become the president of the company in the same year our instrument was installed. The contract was signed in late 1954, and the instrument was installed in January 1956.  

After a year of discussion, consultation, and assessment, the vestry voted for a full restoration to be done by Stephen L. Emery LLC. Of Quakertown, PA.

In May 2021 work began on the project. One rank (rank is a set of 32 individual pipes) of large wooden pipes were removed and sent away to begin refurbishment and also to be sized to be placed in a new location in the organ. This one rank of pipes was a later addition (1980’s) to the organ and were blocking a major portion of the sound coming from the organ. This new location will allow the organ to speak and sound as it was originally intended by Joseph Whiteford.  

In August, the organ company arrived to categorize all parts of the organ prior to removal. They have been extremely careful in this process so that when each piece of the organ is restored, they know exactly where it goes when the instrument is reassembled. 

Once this process was complete, they began carefully removing various parts of the organ as well as all of the pipes.  Much of the instrument has currently been removed and is now off site for restoration. This is when many of the deteriorated materials, (such as leather, cork, and rubber cloth), will be carefully removed and replaced with new. 

If you are in the main church, you will definitely notice the large void where our organ once lived. We are so fortunate to have the finest craftsmen carefully restoring our organ back to its original glory. 

A fund has been established to help defray the cost. If you would like to donate please contact the office at 610-872-5711 or stpaulschester@verizon.net