This tracker organ is in its third and, we hope, final home. It was originally built for Holy Cross Episcopal church in Ft. Plain, New York in 1902. It was Utica builder C.E. Morey’s Opus 193. In 1987 it was renovated and moved to St. David’s Episcopal church in Ames, Iowa. Several years later that parish property was absorbed by Iowa State, and the organ was placed in storage. Dr. Eran Lupu, St. Mary’s music director, noticed the organ on our website, and thought it might be a good fit for Our Lady’s chapel, which had been erected at about the same time.
The Morey organ replaces a small one-manual instrument, which had proved to be inadequate for the liturgies in the chapel. The rebuilding work consisted of re-tabling the manual slider chests, converting the double-rise reservoir to single-rise, renovating the mechanical key action, rebuilding the manual and pedal keyboards, fitting tuning slides to much of the pipework, stripping and refinishing the casework, and providing a blower in a sound-absorbing box. Our work also included modifying the swell box and the case front to fit the organ under the lower ceiling, and making a new right-side post for the case (originally the organ was in a corner). The facade pipes, most of which are speaking, were repaired and beautifully re-decorated and gilded by a pipemaker in Ohio. Wigton Pipe Organs employees spent more than 1300 hours rebuilding and installing the instrument. In August of 2017 Robert Grogan, Organist Emeritus of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, played the dedicatory recital.

STOPLIST

Great
  8′ Open Diapason 58 pipes Zinc, spotted metal, 12 in facade
  8′ Dulciana 58 pipes 12 capped Zinc, rest spotted metal in swell box
  4′ Violina 58 pipes 6 zincs in facade, rest spotted metal
  2′ Fifteenth 58 pipes Repurposed Pipes, spotted metal

Swell
  8′ Violin Diapason 46 pipes 12 basses shared with Stop’d Diapason
  8′ Stop’d Diapason 58 pipes Stopped wood
  4′ Flute harmonique 58 pipes Harmonic from middle C; zinc and spotted metal.
  2-2/3′ and 1-3/5′
  Nazard & Tierce (g) 58 pipes Repurposed pipes; Spotted metal; double Draw
  Tremolo

Pedal
 16′ Bourdon 27 pipes Stopped wood

Totals
  9 stops,
  10 ranks,
  499 pipes

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