Century-old theater organ in State Office Building at ‘tipping point’ for decision on long-term repairs

Christopher Nordwall and a co-worker gave a thorough tuneup to the 1928 Kimball Theatre Pipe Organ in the atrium of the State Office Building less than two years ago. But when he returned Thursday evening to prepare it for another performance the signs of further and rapid decay were evident.

“When we were tuning and working on it I think there were probably 15 to 20 dead notes,” he said during a presentation of the instrument’s history Friday night at the Alaska State Museum. “There’s some mechanical issues that you put certain stop tabs down and things play, and they shouldn’t be playing. And that’s up to the organist that they have to play around those little follies at this point.”

The presentation came after a noontime concert on the organ for dozens of people gathered in the atrium, where such performances have occurred most Fridays for nearly 50 years. The show and presentation also marked the launch of a campaign seeking to raise the $250,000 to $300,000 for a rebuilding of the organ that Nordwall said should allow it to remain playable for another 85 to 90 years, assuming it is regularly maintained.

Right now the organ is “at a delicate tipping point with the instrument where there’s only a couple organists who will play it,” said Ellen Carrlee, curator of the museum, which has owned the organ since 1970.

“If we have dead notes and it’s not reliable, and they have to do things to work around what’s going on and nobody plays it, it’ll die,” she said.

There were 3,000 theater organs worldwide between 1910 and 1940, with an estimated 1,000 still in use today.

“Of those, perhaps 300 are known to be in public places in the United States,” Carrlee said. “Our Kimball Theatre Organ is the only one the public can still hear in Alaska.”

Rebuilding the organ, which will involve replacing some of the original components with digital equivalents, is different than a restoration using refurbished or newly manufactured components matching the originals, Nordwall said. Such a restoration would likely cost about $450,000 and the projected playing life of the organ would remain about the same.

“It’s sort of like taking a 1927 Ford and we’re going to put ABS brakes on it,” he said, describing the difference between rebuilding and refurbishing. “There’s going to be creature comforts that the 21st century has brought organists that make their job a lot easier. What the general public hears, it’s going to sound like the same instrument. Ninety percent of it’s going to function just like it is now, except you’re going to have some parts that are digitized.”

T.J. Duffy, a regular performer of the noontime organ concerts for many years, said during Friday’s presentation that pipe organs became a fixture in churches during the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s and the fundamental components of such instruments — including Juneau’s — can last thousands of years under proper circumstances.

“The point I’m trying to make is those pipes last virtually forever because that organ sounds exactly like it did today as it did in 1928,” he said. “The only problem is the mechanics of making them sound.”

Those mechanics begin with a large umbilical cable “with hundreds and hundreds of wires” that extends from the back of the organ’s console through a wall to the protected chamber where the components of the instrument are, Nordwall said. The covering of the wires is cotton — and thus decaying — and replacements must meet current regulatory codes. Leather and rubber parts have worn out or dried out, and various other levers and electromagnetic mechanisms simply don’t function properly.

There also is an upright piano console attached to the main organ console that has been inoperable for many years.

The rebuilding project would involve disassembling the organ and sending it to a company co-owned by Nordwall — Rose City Organ Builders in Portland, Oregon — and take about a year to complete, he said. The piano console would be repaired at the same time by a specialist near his business.

From the silent film era to silence during the COVID-19 era

The organ was originally built at a cost of $15,000 by C.W. “Sandy” Balcom of Balcom and Vaughan Pipe Organs of Seattle in 1928, Carrlee said during Friday’s presentation. It was installed the same year into the W. D. Gross’ Coliseum Theater in Juneau.

“Unfortunately our theater organ arrives in town in 1928 to accompany silent films and just a couple years later talkies were invented,” she said.

However, the organ was moved in 1939 to the 20th Century Theater where it remained a mainstay until 1970.

“Our organ was still being used inside the 20th Century Theater for many years as entertainment before and during intermissions of films,” Carrlee said. In addition, it was used “on holidays and special occasions such as the visit of John F Kennedy, who gave a speech at the 20th Century Theater in 1958, and during statehood celebrations in 1959.”

The state museum acquired the organ in 1970 when Remleys donated it, “as a museum piece, to be restored and made playable, to remain in Juneau and to be installed in a public place,” according to Carrlee. A campaign to restore the organ was launched in 1976 by Connie Boochever with a funding goal of $30,000, with assistance coming from then U.S. Sen. Mike Gravel who secured a $10,000 grant from the Lilly Foundation and state Sen. Bill Ray who got a state budget allocation to construct a protective chamber for the organ at the State Office Building.

After Balcom and Vaughan Pipe Organs rebuilt the instrument in Seattle in 1977, a rededication ceremony was held at the State Office Building later that year. Carrlee said noontime concerts have been performed most Fridays since that ceremony.

Since that dedication in 1977, there have been regular concerts Fridays at noon. Other current performers besides Duffy are J. Allan MacKinnon — who’s been playing the instrument since 1961 and was present at both of Friday’s events — Laurie Clough and Alice Branton.

“Every year we hear from visitors to Juneau who request an opportunity to play our organ,” Carrlee said.

The organ was maintained and tuned during “sporadic visits” from John K. Moir, the last remaining employee of the company that built the organ, she said. His last visit was March of 2020, just before COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic, and he died in 2022.

Meanwhile, with work-at-home orders issued to government employees the organ in the State Office Building went unplayed. When workers returned the organ — which already was due for major maintenance work — was no longer playable.

“Not being played during the pandemic was hard on the instrument and age is a challenge for all of us,” Carrlee said.

A friend of Moir recommended Nordwall’s company to revive the instrument. In late May of 2023, Nordwall and co-worker Michael Ruppert conducted an inspection and tuneup of the organ’s 548 pipes, its percussion and other instrumentation, the two keyboard consoles, and other components.

MacKinnon then performed the first post-COVID concert on the organ during a noontime Friday show in early June of 2023.

The next chapter in the organ’s history will largely be up to the community since the museum’s funding and staffing levels mean it can’t take on the primary responsibility of rehabilitating the instrument, Carrlee said. She and other museum officials said they are hoping to hear from people interested in supporting the project.

“The time has come to consider a once-in-a-generation rebuild,” she said. “Does the public want this to happen? This is what we are here to discuss.”

• Contact Mark Sabbatini at mark.sabbatini@juneauempire.com or (907) 957-2306.