a close-up of a nameplate on what appears to be a musical instrument, likely an organ or piano, given the visible keys above it. The plate is metallic and engraved with decorative script. It reads: "George Stevens, Maker PRESENTED TO THE FIRST PARISH IN SHIRLEY, BY MRS. HENRIETTA WHITNEY. (1847.)"

In the organ-making history of East Cambridge, two small-business owners dominated

By Beth Folsom, 2025

As Cambridge enters the season of graduations, weddings and first Communion and other church-related celebrations, it is worth noting the city’s history of building the instrument that provides the soundtrack to many of these events: the church organ.

East Cambridge in particular has been home to several organ and piano manufacturers beginning in the mid-19th century. Like its wood-centered counterpart, furniture-making, organ making in the city had been largely an offshoot of a Boston industry. William Goodrich, founder of an organ industry there, moved his shop to East Cambridge in 1828, occupying a lot at the corner of Fifth and Otis streets. When Goodrich died in 1833, his firm was taken over by two former employees, George Stevens and William Gayetty. Stevens assumed sole ownership of the company upon Gayetty’s death in 1839.

Stevens was a successful organ maker during the 1840s, producing instruments for rural churches along the East Coast as well as for the Boston and Cambridge markets. While manufacturers in Boston had cornered the metropolitan market by the 1850s, East Cambridge organ builders set their sights on churches in the suburbs and in small towns and rural areas. Stevens and the other major builder of the time, Samuel Hamill, were known for their conservative small and medium-sized church organs, which were sold throughout rural New England in the second half of the 19th century. Both firms began to sell organs further afield as their fame grew, and also as the regional markets became saturated.

In contrast to the larger, machine-run parlor organ and piano makers in Cambridgeport, Stevens’ and Hamill’s factories were small and featured largely handcrafted products for houses of worship. Despite his growing fame as an organ maker and a politician (Stevens was an alderman and served as Cambridge’s mayor in 1851-1852), Stevens kept his company small, employing just four full-time workers in contrast to several hundred laborers at the Cambridgeport factories. Despite its size, however, the firm made more than 800 organs under Stevens’ direction. Upon his retirement in 1892, leadership was taken over by employees James Gilbert and George Butler, but the new owners closed the firm just a decade later in 1902.

a black and white full-shot photograph of a large, ornate pipe organ. The organ has a grand wooden casing with decorative columns and arches. Numerous pipes of varying sizes are visible, with some smaller, decorative pipes at the bottom. The organ's keyboard console is in the lower center, with a bench in front of it. The overall design suggests a classical or historical style of organ. — An organ made by the S.S. Hamilll Co. of East Cambridge for the University Lutheran Church of East Lansing, Michigan. Courtesy Organ Historical Society.

Samuel Hamill, the other major East Cambridge organ maker, completed his training in New York and Boston and came to East Cambridge in 1861. Similar in products, small workforce and customer base to Stevens’ firm, Hamill advertised more frequently and built organs for a wider geographic area, selling to churches as far away as the Midwest and even Cuba. His factory at 101-103 Gore St. employed just six workers, similar to Stevens’s four. Hoping to expand his production, Hamill moved to a larger factory on Bent and Sixth streets in 1892, but by that time the market was becoming too saturated to continue to support two East Cambridge church organ manufacturers, and Hamill’s company soon ceased production.

By the turn of the 20th century, the market for organs in Cambridge and the country as a whole had shifted to the smaller parlor organs (which used reeds instead of pipes) and pianos produced by larger mechanized factories such as those in Cambridgeport. Stevens and Hamill remain important names in church organs, and many of their instruments are still in use in houses of worship locally, regionally, and even internationally, ensuring the place of East Cambridge in the history of organ production.

This article originally appeared in Cambridge Day.