September 28-30, 1916
“These Catholic affairs are horrible. To my mind they are utterly meaningless. There is no help or confirmation in them!” From Kate Shippen Roosevelt’s pen to the ears of austere Episcopalians everywhere, these words echoed off the pages of her diary written on September 29, 1916 after having attended a funeral service for her dear friend, Gertrude Adams.
Apparently the service held at St. Agnes’ Church located at 143 East43rd Street and Lexington Avenue was as elaborate as the edifice itself. The brick and limestone neo-Gothic structure with lacy spires, imposing rooflines, sky-high twin towers and slabs of stained-glass was christened St. Agnes in 1873 as a sanctuary for the Italian laborers working on the construction of the Grand Central Terminal. Taking a break from their back-breaking work, these immigrants came to hear Mass, confess their sins and say their prayers in the middle of bustling mid-town Manhattan. The original building was destroyed by fire in 1992 and re-opened in 1998. The two original towers anchor the new structure, built in the Italianate style to resemble the Church of Il Gesu in Rome.
Convent of St. Elizabeth
Kate had no criticism for the architecture of the building, but what went on inside was another matter. She made no bones about her disdain for Catholics and their rites and rituals. A diary entry she wrote in 1912 rambled and ranted about her son-in-law, Langdon Geer’s aunt who had gone to St. Elizabeth’s School for Girls in Morristown, New Jersey, lamenting “the nuns made a catholic out of her.” She made converting to Catholicism sound more like joining a cult of cannibals or moving to a leper colony.
Whatever her thoughts on the funeral ceremony, I was sure that she could not criticize the music. Catholics know how to put on a show with hymns and choirs that usually insure there’s not a dry eye in the house. And as readers of The Dowager’s Diary know, Kate Roosevelt had an ear for music, often attending concerts and church services featuring organs designed by her late husband, the talented, Hilborne L. Roosevelt, President Theodore Roosevelt’s cousin.
St. Agnes Catholic Church
From the time he showcased his award-winning invention, the world’s first electric pipe organ at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876 until his death in 1886 Hilborne oversaw the design and personally installed organs all over the world.
Cathedral of the Incarnation, Garden City, Long Island
In 1883, just after he married Kate Shippen, Hilborne Roosevelt set up shop at 145-149 West 18th Street not far from the newlywed’s first home at 40 West 18th Street. The adjoining four-story brick buildings had a combined frontage of fifty-one feet. The rear portion was narrowed to thirty-six feet to accommodate an alley on either side. It was at this new and enlarged facility that the musical master-mind undertook the manufacture of his Magnum Opus, the world’s largest organ, designed for the Cathedral of the Incarnation in Garden City, Long Island. This Roosevelt Organ was just slightly larger than the one at Royal Albert Hall in England. It was built through the years 1879 to 1883 at a cost of $34,100.
A.T. Stewart
The cathedral was the memorial of Cornelia Stewart to her late-husband, Alexander Turney Stewart (1803-1876), the Irish immigrant who single-handedly invented America’s first department store. In 1823 he opened a dry goods store in lower Manhattan. After several moves and expansions, his business, named A.T. Stewart’s moved into the Cast Iron Palace on an elite stretch of Broadway known as the Ladies’ Mile. It was the site of many a shopping spree indulged in by President Lincoln’s wife, Mary Todd Lincoln. The “First Lady” once ran up a bill there of $27,000.
Moses Taylor Memorial Church, Elberon, New Jersey
When Catherine Taylor, the widow of the New York City, banker Moses Taylor, erected a memorial to her late-husband she also had a Hilborne Roosevelt Organ installed. It was not the largest in the world, but it is one of most enduring. Now called “The Cadillac of Organs,” it was one of the last to be built and personally installed by Roosevelt himself. The organ at the Moses Taylor Memorial Church in Elberon, New Jersey is still in pristine working order and has been used for summer services in the sea-side chapel since its dedication in 1885.
Hilborne Roosevelt Organ
Neither of these two memorial churches is Catholic, both are Protestant, but the Roosevelt Organ Works was not prejudice as to where or for whom they installed their organs. According to the book, Hilborne and Frank Roosevelt by David Fox, “Purchasers of Roosevelt organs included churches, chapels, residences, schools and temples throughout the United States, Canada, Ecuador, England, France, Germany and Italy.”
Sharon Hazard’s Dowager’s Diary appears on Thursday.
Photo One:
St. Agnes Catholic Church Interior
New York Organ Project
Photo Two:
Convent of St. Elizabeth
from a postcard
Photo Three:
St. Agnes Catholic Church
West 43rd Street, New York City
wiki
Photo Four:
Cathedral of the Incarnation, Garden City, Long Island
website: Cathedral of the Incarnation
Photo Five:
A.T. Stewart
Engraving, New York Public Library Digital Collection
Photo Six:
Moses Taylor Memorial Church, Elberon, New Jersey
Organ Historical Society Photo by Robert Lubischer
Photo Seven:
Hilborne Roosevelt Organ installed at Moses Taylor, Elberon Memorial Church, 1885
Author Collection
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