Back to the Northwest Recording Studio main page
Harold Turner at the WGN console, March 5, 1951
|
According to Steven Ramm of Philadelphia, PA (stevenramm@aol.com): "The WGN organ started as a 2/7 Wurlitzer in a studio in the Bismark hotel. It was a repossessed from a band leader who defaulted on his payments to Wurlitzer and resold to WGN. That can explain the unusual specification which included a brass trumpet. When the WGN radio studio was built at Tribune Tower, WGN had the Kimball Company rebuild it as a 3/10 adding 3 Kimball ranks, a Open Diapason from 16' (extension was Diapason pipes not Diaphones as Wurlitzer would have done), a church style English Horn and a Clarinet. The organ had 2 consoles, one in the studio where the chamber was located and another in a remote studio on the first floor. The organist had to listen to the organ through earphones in the remote studio. When the organ was removed from WGN the Kimball portions, including the console were sold to a private individual, as only the Wurlitzer portion was installed at Mundelein. The Kimball console was severely damaged and the 16' Open Diapason was destroyed in a residence fire in Wisconsin. Both the WGN organ and WLS organ were heard regularly through the late fifties, with staff organist Harold Turner providing a half hour program each Sunday morning. The WLS organ was also heard on Sunday mornings on a program which featured reading the Sunday funnies to Chicago kiddies. It was also heard at noon every day on a live Prairie Farmer interview/variety program called the Noon Show featuring long time staff organist Howard Peterson at the Barton. The Prairie Farmer studio on W. Washington was abandoned after ABC bought the Prairie Farmer and moved the broadcast operations, and the Barton was sold, leaving WGN as the last of the major stations with a pipe organ. After Harold Turner retired, the organ was used infrequently, usually for programs by outside groups, as the radio staffers preferred using the Hammond as it could be moved around." Ed: It is not known how Balcom & Vaughan came to be in possession of the WGN console, whether they repaired it following fire damage at the studio, or whether they purchased the second console which was not damaged. |