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TANNENBERG ORGAN

The Tannenberg Organ in Historical Context

It was during the tenure of the Rev. John Andreas Krug that the leaders of Trinity decided to expand their little log church. At the time, one-half of the families in the City were members of Trinity. And by the time Rev. Krug arrived in 1764,
they had been sending their children to the German School at Trinity for some years, as they wanted them educated in their native tounge and not in the inferior English language.*

Two hundred and six members subscribed to a fund to pay for the improvements and provide for the installation of what would be the first organ in the City.

The congregation secured the services of David Tannenberg of Lititz, PA
(in what is now Lancaster County). He received the sum of two hundred thirty pounds (Pennsylvania currency) and began his work in late 1769.

Just a few months earlier, in June, 14 members appeared before the Synodical Meeting at Philadelphia demanding the removal of Pr. Krug on the grounds of “physical weakness.” A petition signed by one hundred and six members was
also presented, asking for Krug's retention. The Ministerium decided that Pr. Krug would remain at Trinity, despite “his physical weakness, his inability to endure horseback riding, the still rough condition of the roads and the annoying circumstances of having fourteen dissatisfied members in an envious and unfriendly spirit, watching every word, step, act, feature and gesture of the pastor, having no eye for that which in him is truly good and the effect of divine grace or special talent, but transforming gnats into camels, never resting in their persecutions and slanders.”

The debut of the Tannenberg organ was on September 1, 1771. The specifications for the instrument were:

MANUAL

1. Principal, 8 feet
2. Viola de Gamba (metal), 8 feet
3. Gedact (wood), 8 feet
4. Flauto Traver (wood), 8 feet
5. Octave (metal), 4 feet
6. Sub-octave (metal), 2 feet
7. Fifth (metal), 3 feet
8. Gemshorn (metal), 4 feet
9. Mixture (metal), 3 feet
10. Coupler with pedals

PEDAL

1. Sub-bass (wood), 16 feet
2. Octave (wood), 6 feet

Alas, the good Pastor Krug would not hear the new organ. He left following the 1771 Easter service. Despite efforts to call a new pastor, none would come to Trinity for two years. Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, the father of Lutheranism in America, intervened.

Finally a new pastor, Frederick Niemeyer, was called in 1773, and was immediately embroiled in a lawsuit concerning his salary. In 1774, one Rev. Philip Grotz took to the pulpit, but his pastorate lasted only three months. Then, Trinity appealed for a second time to Muhlenberg to accept a call to Trinity, but he refused – referring instead Rev. Henry Moller. Two years later Moller submitted his letter of resignation to Dr. Bodo Otto, the president of the Vestry (and the senior physician in the medical service of the Revolutionary Army).

* In 1803, Trinity would become the first congregation in the City to offer worship services in English when it called the Rev. Henry Augustus Muhelnberg; when he ascended the pulpit in April, 1803, he was 20 years old. Services were to be bi-lingual in both English and German. With 1/5 of the new pastor's salary to be paid by "the English element."
It didn't work, and that yields to yet another story in Trinity's long and rich history.