Page 14 - MLD Book

literally went outside and threw up. When Iris died, she left me a picture of her favorite dog, a snapshot of her as a WAC, and a cracked teapot. That’s ok. Those things meant the most to
her.
1979
Things progressed well at Calvary through the seventies under Lou Hemmers, and in 1979, the choir suddenly grew from about 30 to 58! The magic of that growth was created by my Melvin, who had been ensconced at St. Francis in the Fields since 1966. The Rector there, Steve Davenport, was in no way a musician, didn’t care for music, and had no ear for it at all. He mostly stayed out of the way as Melvin built a fantastic music program. This is a rich church but Melvin’s salary never exceeded $6,000 a year. However... Highlight of Melvin’s tenure was the night he went to the vestry to explain that the old organ was worn out and they needed a new one. A vestry member wrote out a check for $55,000 total cost right on the spot!!!! There was no collegial interaction with Steve, although Melvin and Dick Humke, the assistant, became very close. Dick’s favorite story was as the clergy and choir were assembling one Sunday for the processional, Steve turned to Dick and said, “You preaching today or am I?” That lack of dedication and preparedness came to a head one Sunday when Steve, anxious to meet a golfing date at noon, cut out the anthem that the choir had worked especially hard on. That did it! Melvin quit right after that service, and I grabbed him immediately for Calvary. He remained as a volunteer director and sometimes organist until
the fateful 2012.
St. Francis was one of three fulltime jobs (LBS and U of L the other two) that Melvin was undertaking in 1979, so an offer for him to be a volunteer choir director at Calvary with me doing all the planning and Melvin coming in on Sundays just to conduct the rehearsal and service, was an attractive offer to him. (The choir was so good that we only needed to rehearse on Sunday mornings, and that was needed also because the choir consisted of people from all over the area for whom a weekday rehearsal would have been hard to do.) Besides, we four Dickinsons could all go to the same church together for the first time ever. Lou Hemmers was very excited about this, and fully supportive. The choir at St. Francis was so horrified about Melvin leaving that most of them left and followed him to Calvary, hence the ballooning of the choir from 30 to 58! Among those who followed him were Jim and LaNell Barnes, Pat and Lois O’Hara, Harold and Mary Ann Johnson, Paul and Meredith Murray, Dan and Doree Jarboe, and a host of others. They remained and became integral parts of Calvary. Marion Six was the vestment Mother, and she set out to try to clothe all these people. We ended up ordering vestment kits and making our own – they were blue. Not fancy like the present expensive ones, but free ones that were made with love and devotion, and served us well for many years before being discarded with disdain for fancy costly ones. Straight from Wipple in England, no less! Wilma Wilson was the main rescuer for those of us who couldn’t sew, along with Stephanie Smith. ! I still have mine in the closet at home. David Broadhead was the biggest (literally) challenge for a vestment, but Wilma solved that problem by sewing two vestments together.
1980
With this new choir development, I was spending more and more time at Calvary, so in 1980, the vestry finally decided at Lou Hemmers’ urging, that I could become full time but I would need to take on more jobs to justify the huge salary of $21,000 a year!!! So in addition to music, I became director of outreach and communications, which meant continuing the overseeing the food pantry, doing all the bulletins, and tending to publicity as