History of the Starkey Organ

Music has been a part of the history of Grace Church. In 1880, the congregation at Grace was given a pitch by a wooden flute. Over the years the church employed the Calder Organ, then the McKinley Memorial Organ, and finally the Starkey Organ (The Austin Opus 862 of 1919), which was was donated in 1919 by Mr. William Paul Starkey, a trustee, to honor the men and women who served our country in World War I.

Opus 862-1117 was rebuilt and expanded by M.P. Moller Company during the fifties and sixties. The 4- Manual (individual keyboards), 82 -Rank Organ has between 4,800 and 5,000 pipes. The decorative pipes in the church sanctuary are from the original Austin Opus 862. In 1973 a brilliant festival trumpet was added to the Antiphonal Organ in Memory of Robert S. Clippinger, former organist-choirmaster of the church. The reconditioning along with this addition was made possible through a generous gift from Mr. And Mrs. Charles E. Snyder of Harrisburg.

The 1919 Starkey Organ was built and installed by expert voicer, Mr. Frank Steere, of the Austin Organ Company of Hartford Connecticut. The organist and choirmaster of that era, Mr. Bernard R. Mausert, collaborated in the arrangement of the organ.

Dr. Ronald Sider, Organist and Choirmaster Emeritus - 1973 - 2006.

This great instrument, nobly placed in a church which has endured more than a century of our nation's history, is in the highest services of man, now speaking in song to the praise of Almighty God.