First Christian Church
Owensboro, Ky
Austin, 1994
Opus 2760
Great
Swell
Choir
|
Pedal
*=Preparation Couplers
|
Evansville AGO's 2012 Pedals, Pipes and Pizza at First
Christian Church
Historical
Summary:
Austin Organ Co. (1920s, Opus 1690) 3 manuals. 30
ranks.
Austin Organs, Inc. (Opus 2760) 3 manuals. 33 ranks
(rebuild and
enlargement of Opus 1690).
(Summary from the Organ Historical Society website: http://organsociety.bsc.edu/)
"....And so was the reporter for the Daily Messenger who came to cover the dedication of this room on February 26, 1905. The front page story in the paper of that day is full of wonders to report –313 electric light bulbs filling the room with a gentle glow, the first electric blower for a pipe organ ever installed in Owensboro....The old organ they had brought from Lewis Street was inadequate. Dr. Crossfield solicited a new one from Andrew Carnegie, and so the old organ was out and the new one replaced it. And just twenty-five years after all this was dedicated, our church was at it again. New education space, a new gymnasium and kitchen, a whole building devoted to education, recreation and fellowship...and a new pipe organ to replace the one that Andrew Carnegie had donated just two decades before....place(d) the new organ across a divided chancel (now currently moveable around the chancel), and a new choir area. The Gothic arch was removed in the early 1990's remodeling and the ceiling war restored to its original grandeur." (From the church's history page on the church's website, adapted from a sermon preached by Charles Watkins on September 15, 1991)
In March 2013 the sanctuary was gutted by fire caused by
a lightening storm.