Thaddeus A. Snively: First Years of the Parish, 1893-1907

Sunday, January 15, 1893. "CROWDED AND COLD. Marked Characteristics of Nearly All Street-Cars," read the lead story in that day's Chicago Tribune.  "TRIALS OF WEST-SIDERS. The Early Morning Service Declared To Be Wretched. NORTH SIDE NO BETTER OFF. Even the South Side Lines Are Said To Be Falling from Grace." The poor service must have been a particular hardship during the previous days; a cold spell had gripped the city and the entire eastern third of the country for most of the preceding week, with Chicago temperatures reaching -12 by midnight on the 14th (they would drop to -16 for several hours early Sunday morning before moderating later in the day). Chicagoans suffering from the extreme weather could plan to purchase on the following day, according to their budgets, real mink capes at $25.00, astrakhan fur reefers at $20.00 or military ulsters at $7.50 from Schlesinger and Mayer's at the southeast corner of State and Madison Streets; men's winter underwear at $1.25 and 49c could be bought at the Hub on the northwest corner of State and Jackson.  (Those persons preferring to shop at Marshall Field's would have had to wait a day to see what was available, since Field's did not at that time advertise on Sundays.) 

Much news space was devoted to the forthcoming World's Columbian Exposition: a gang of French crooks with plans to "work the Fair" had just been arrested, and an article by Caroline S. Corbin discussed the question of Sunday opening: "If the directors ... will stop all machinery ... and will set apart a building for religious meetings, where eminent divines may discourse upon the spiritual needs and opportunities of the hour ... it will be such an expression of an impressive and beautiful Christian Sabbath as the world has never before seen." A patent dispute on the incandescent light had been settled in favor of Thomas Edison, with implications for Chicago electrical service. The romantically minded could read the account of the elopement of Marion Ewing, whose cousin Adlai Stevenson I would be inaugurated as vice-president under Grover Cleveland on March 4.

Only a small announcement among the listings of religious services on an inside page records: "All Saints Church.  No. 757 North Clark Street.  Services at 11 a.m. by the Rev. E.R. Bishop, Archdeacon of the diocese, and the Rev. T.A. Snively, Troy, N.Y."

All Saints' Mission, as it was more properly known, had experienced a checkered history. By the mid-1880s, as more Chicagoans were moving to the city's north side, residents felt a need for another Episcopal church in the area in addition to St. James Church (not then the cathedral of the diocese) on Huron Street and Cass Street (now Wabash Avenue), and the Church of Our Saviour on Fullerton Avenue.  (The Church of the Ascension on LaSalle Avenue, because of its Anglo-Catholic churchmanship, may not have been considered as an alternative by some of the newcomers to the area.)  In late 1885, under the auspices of St. James Church, a store at 633 (later 1522) North Clark Street was rented, and St. James Mission, as it was known, began services on December 27 with the Reverend Montgomery N. Throop in charge.[1] By June 1886 the mission had attracted so many people from St. James Church that it was deemed advisable to move to a site as far north of St. James as possible. The location at 757 (later 1752) North Clark Street was rented, and the congregation adopted the name of All Saints' Mission.

An unidentified newspaper clipping in parish archives, probably dating from early 1889, is titled: "A Bartender Sues A Church." There appears to have been some dispute as to whether the mission's finance committee or Mr. Throop was responsible for payment of the rent on the 633 North Clark Street site for the period remaining on the lease after the congregation moved north. Joseph Cole, a bartender at the Palmer House and owner of the site, understandably became impatient and took legal action when after more than two years he had not received his rent. The matter was settled amicably, the finance committee and Mr. Throop each paying half the costs.

Mr. Throop must have been in poor health, for according to this account he left the city in 1886 due to illness. The Reverend Joseph G.H. Barry succeeded him for a short time.  (In view of St. Chrysostom's later reputation as a Low Church parish, it is interesting to note that Fr. Barry would afterwards serve as dean of the High Church seminary Nashotah House and rector of the well-known New York City Anglo-Catholic parish St. Mary the Virgin.) After Father Barry's departure, the Reverend James Foster was briefly in charge. Attendance had declined by early 1888, and Bishop William McLaren asked Mr. Throop, whose health had presumably improved, to return as priest in charge. By 1889, the congregation numbered 153.

Maude Stein Snyder, for many years a St. Chrysostom's parishioner, attended All Saints' Sunday school in 1892 and preserved in a scrapbook an Easter card sent to her in that year. She wrote beside the card that "Mr. Locke was Supt. of Church School, he came to the Church from N.Y.  Miss Booge was my teacher's name. Both had lived at the Plaza Hotel, Clark and North Ave."  (Mr. Locke is probably the J.M. Locke who served on St. Chrysostom's vestry in 1898 and 1899.)  Although the Sunday school must have been active at that time, All Saints' itself fell on hard times and closed by the end of 1892, leaving debts of $250. Those persons who braved the cold to attend the service of January 15, 1893 at the reorganized mission must surely have hoped that the new priest in charge would have greater success than his predecessors in establishing a church in the area.

The Reverend Thaddeus Alexander Snively was, at this time, not quite forty-two years old; he was born in Greencastle, Pennsylvania, a small town just north of the Maryland border, on February 1, 1851. He was the eighth and probably the youngest child of Daniel Snively, a merchant, and his wife Mary Ann; the Snivelys seem to have been well-to-do, as 1850 census records show that the household included four servants and that Daniel Snively owned property worth $7400, a substantial sum for that time. At least one other of the Snivelys' sons became a priest; their oldest child William, seventeen years older than Thaddeus, served in a number of parishes in the eastern United States, was the author of several books, and for some years was a member of the standing committee of the diocese of Louisiana. Another son may also have been a clergyman; the Reverend Summerfield Snively, who was rector of the American Church at Nice at the time of his death in February 1914, is possibly the three-year-old "Somerton Snively" listed in the 1850 census records. There were three other brothers and two sisters; one brother, whose name is not known to us, fought (according to family tradition) on the Confederate side in the Civil War and was killed in battle in Texas.

Thaddeus Snively attended Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, the latter presumably for his theological studies. He was ordained to the diaconate in 1872 and to the priesthood in 1875; his first post was as curate to his brother William, at that time rector of Christ Church, Albany, New York. Later he served at the American Episcopal Church in Geneva, Switzerland and at Christ Church, Quincy, Massachusetts, before becoming rector of St. John's Church in Troy, New York in 1881, where he remained until 1892. For a short time before he came to Chicago he had been at the American Episcopal Church in Florence, Italy.

Mr. Snively would appear to have been considerably overqualified for his new position. It seems at first surprising that a man of his age and experience should choose to come to a struggling mission church in an area where he apparently had no previous ties. Almost certainly the reason lies in his personal life. He had married Eliza Crosby, probably by early 1880, since their first son Alexander was born in March 1881; a second son, Schuyler, was born to the couple in 1884. However, according to a 1987 letter to Robert Howell from Mr. Snively's grandson Murray, his grandparents' marriage had been an arranged one and had not been happy. The couple separated and were later divorced; Eliza Snively remarried and moved to Canada with her second husband and her sons. Although the exact date of the separation and divorce is not known, it is very likely that Thaddeus Snively's departure from Troy may have been occasioned by the failure of his marriage. In an age when divorce in general was frowned upon and, for the clergy, almost unheard of, the choice of positions available to a divorced clergyman must have been severely limited; Mr. Snively, too, may have wished to make a fresh start and to accept the challenge of establishing a new congregation in an area unfamiliar to him.

Joanna Zander, in her seventy-fifth anniversary book The Story of St. Chrysostom's Church, written at a time when a few parishioners still survived who remembered Mr. Snively, wrote that he never failed to remember the birth dates of children in his congregation: a poignant note, since he seems to have seen relatively little of his own sons following his divorce and move to Chicago. John Henry Hopkins commented in The Great Forty Years in the Diocese of Chicago, a history covering the years 1893 to 1933, that Mr. Snively was "popular in every best sense," with "possibly the most extensive social entree within the reach of any Chicago priest, then or now." He adds: "One can almost hear him even yet, pleading with someone, 'Oh, DON'T say St. ChrySOStom's!' with the accent strongly on SOS."[2]

The adoption of the name of St. Chrysostom's instead of All Saints' was Mr. Snively's first official act as priest in charge. On January 20, five days after the first service, Bishop William E. McLaren wrote:

The name of the organized mission heretofore known as All Saints', is hereby changed to

                                       S. Chrysostom's.

The reasons for Mr. Snively's selection of St. John Chrysostom as the patron saint of the mission are not known to us and can only be guessed at. It was almost certainly necessary to make some change of name to distinguish the mission from All Saints' Church in Ravenswood, an area which had only a short time previously been incorporated into the city of Chicago; Mr. Snively may also have wished to dissociate his new congregation from the unsuccessful former mission. St. John Chrysostom was the author of the final prayer used at Morning and Evening Prayer services, and was famous during his lifetime for his excellence as a preacher (the name Chrysostom, "golden mouthed", refers to this characteristic); from this point of view the choice would prove appropriate, since the parish has throughout its history maintained the Evangelical emphasis on preaching and successive rectors have been known for the excellence of their sermons. It is also possible that Mr. Snively chose a saint whose feast day, January 27 in the Western Church, was close to the date of the reorganization of the mission.[3]

The Diocesan Board of Missions paid $90 of the $250 debt remaining from the former All Saints' Mission; St. Chrysostom's took responsibility for the remaining $160. To enable the debt to be paid off as soon as possible, Mr. Snively served without compensation until Easter Day, April 2. By the following week the debt was paid and the mission's finance committee held its first meeting. Its members were John R. Adams, an importer; Albert Blanchard, a contractor; Joseph T. Bowen, a banker (whose wife Louise DeKoven Bowen would in later years become well known for her work at Hull House and other social service organizations); Henry Durkee, president of an iron ore firm; Otto J. Weidner, listed as "manager" in the 1893 Chicago city directory; and Harry T. Pardee and his brother-in-law Henry N. Cooper, employed in real estate. (Mr. Cooper was married to Harry Pardee's sister Julia; another sister, Emily, was the wife of St. Chrysostom's parishioner William Street, and their brother Luther, an Episcopal priest, was at this time secretary of the diocese. The Pardees' father Theron was listed in the first directory of Chicago residents, published in 1844.) The committee agreed to pay Mr. Snively a salary of $1800 a year; he expressed his willingness to accept $1500 if the mission could not afford the larger amount.

A milestone occurred on the evening of Ascension Day, May 18, 1893, when Bishop McLaren made his first visitation to St. Chrysostom's, confirming a class of eight. One of the members of this class would play an important role in the life of the parish in the years to come. Frederick Chase Spalding, nineteen years old, had already been working for five years in the newspaper business and for most of his life would be a proofreader for the Chicago Daily News. The Spalding family (parents Oliver and Katie, Frederick, and five other children) had been members of the former All Saints Mission and continued at St. Chrysostom's. Frederick Spalding would serve as Sunday school teacher and superintendent, lay reader, Scoutmaster, camp director and vestry member during his forty-six years in the parish, devoting much of his time, talents and treasure to the church.

As 1893 passed, plans were under way to find a permanent home for the church. Henry Cooper and Henry Durkee were appointed to examine possible sites on Dearborn Avenue (as the street was then called) and State Street. Two alternatives were considered: a location adjoining the "Harz property," a stable at 502 (later 1332) Dearborn Avenue, and a 75-foot lot at 544 (later 1424) Dearborn Avenue between Schiller Street and Burton Place. Although at first the site near the Harz stable was preferred, tax considerations led to the selection of the property further north. On February 7, 1894, lawyer Percival Fuller was appointed to head a committee for purchase of the property; by the fifteenth of the month, pledges of over $13,000 toward the purchase price of $28,000 had been received. The committee visited the Ladies' Society before sponsoring a parish-wide meeting on February 21 at which a total of $28,662.50 ($5200 of which was in cash) was pledged; Mr. Fuller and Edward Martyn, vice-president of Philip Armour's Union Stock Yards and Traction Company, were the largest donors with $2500 each. The visit to the Ladies' Society was apparently a fruitful one, as seven women including a dressmaker and a stenographer were among those making contributions at the meeting. A committee of the rector, three men and three women was appointed to raise additional subscriptions. One of its members was Fannie Parsons Warren, whose husband William would briefly serve on the vestry in 1896; their son L. Parsons Warren was a vestry member and Sunday school superintendent from the mid-1920s until he retired and left the city in 1952.

On Easter Monday, March 26, 1894, St. Chrysostom's became incorporated as a parish. Henry Durkee was elected the first senior warden and Joseph Bowen the junior warden. John Adams and Harry Pardee from the finance committee continued as members of the vestry. Other vestry included two doctors: John H. Chew, successor to Fernand Henrotin as head of Henrotin Hospital and the Chicago Policlinic, and H. Newberry Hall, clerk of the vestry (a direct descendant of Miles Standish) who, interestingly enough in view of future Crane connections with the parish, served as Crane Company physician in addition to his private practice. The two principal contributors toward purchase of the land, Percival Fuller and Edward Martyn, were, not surprisingly, named to the vestry. Insurance company president John Rand (who, with his family, lived at the Plaza Hotel, where Mr. Snively resided throughout his ministry at St. Chrysostom's); William D.C. Street, banker and manager of the Chicago Clearing House; and Samuel Clifford Payson and Winfield H. Scott, whose occupations are not known to us, were the remaining members of the group. (Mr. Scott was, as far as we can tell, not related to the general of that name.)

The vestry's first official action was to extend a call to Mr. Snively to serve as rector at a salary of $2400 a year. His letter of acceptance reads:

 

I ... herewith accept the honour and privilege of acting as your leader in the important work before us with sincere thanks and a grateful heart.

I feel sure that the interest and enthusiasm which have marked the incipient stages of our movement will grow and spread in the future. I would face the responsibility with great uncertainty, were it not for the many proofs we have already had of the great need of a New Parish here, and of the deep sympathy with which our efforts have thus far been welcomed.

Back of all this I see most clearly God's direction and guidance and the assurance of His blessing in the future.

In his annual address to the 1894 diocesan convention Bishop McLaren made reference to "the feeble mission, formerly known as All Saints', in Lincoln Park," which had "grown to large proportions under the ministry of the Rev. T.A. Snively." According to the Reverend John Henry Hopkins as quoted in Massey Shepherd's centennial History of St. James' Church, 1834-1934, at least some of the growth in St. Chrysostom's membership may have come from former St. James parishioners who disliked the strong low church views of their rector, the Reverend Floyd W. Tomkins, and found the services at St. Chrysostom's more to their taste. Parish archives contain no material to confirm or deny this statement, which may indicate Mr. Tomkins' extremely low churchmanship rather than any extremes by St. Chrysostom's in the other direction; however, it has been suggested that the choice of a patron saint whose feast day was not included in the Prayer Book calendar may indicate some degree of high churchmanship on the part of Mr. Snively.

On May 15, plans by architect Clinton J. Warren for the new church were approved; ground was broken on July 24. By November the church was completed, and the first service on the present site was held on Sunday, November 4.[4] Vestry minutes list a number of donations to the new building, some still in use nearly a hundred years later. The largest of the brass processional crosses presently in use in the parish was given by vestry member Samuel Clifford Payson in the name of his two small sons. The large silver alms basin was a memorial to Clarence Hopkins Dyer, a coal merchant whose father had been mayor of Chicago in 1856. The baptismal font, a gift of manufacturer C.F. Quincy and his wife Etta, commemorates "Dorothy Quincy, 1882," possibly a deceased child of the couple. The small silver bread box was the gift of Elizabeth Pardee, the mother of Harry Pardee, Henry Cooper's wife Julia and William Street's wife Emily. The silver stand for the altar service book was presented by Nannie K. Beckwith, an active member of the Women's Guild in the early years of the parish, in memory of her husband Franklin, a salesman who had died in 1889. No information has been found on Henry Trevor Cook, in whose memory the hymn boards were given (though a Mrs. H.T. Cook lived on Rush Street south of the church at this period), nor is information available on John Leverett Rogers, whose wife donated in his memory the large brass cross with the Lamb of God at its center, originally used on the main altar and presently on the chapel altar.[5]  (The seven-branch candelabra now in the Guild Room, given by vestry member Newberry Hall in honor of his two small sons, were also originally on the main altar.) The congregation at this time reportedly numbered twenty-two families. Not long after the first services, on December 5, the Northeastern Deanery held its winter meeting in the new church.

A contract was signed in November 1894 for an $1100 Kimball organ, and Paolo F. Campiglio engaged as organist for two years at a salary of $600 a year. A concert program in Maude Snyder's collection states that "Signor Campiglio, late of Chickering Hall, New York City, is also organist and choirmaster at St. Chrysostom's Church, where he has a large choir of boys and men." (A handwritten comment by Mrs. Snyder adds that he was known in later years as "the great Campanino" and that he died while on tour in Chicago.) The Tribune of April 14, 1895 listed the music and hymns to be used at that day's Easter service at St. Chrysostom's; the service opened with Braga's "Meditation" for organ, violin and horn, the hymns included the traditional Easter favorite "Jesus Christ is Risen Today," while among the anthems performed by the choir were Tours' Te Deum in F preceding the Collect, Sir George Elvey's anthem, "Christ, being raised from the dead, dieth no more," and the Agnus Dei from Gounod's Messe Solenelle.  Signor Campiglio's own "Festival March" concluded the service.[6]

On November 30, 1894, a parish-wide meeting was scheduled in the church, "where, under the direction of the Committee on Pews, arrangements will be made for the rental of all Pews for the coming year." Pews 1 and 2 were reserved for the bishop and the rector, respectively; other pews were assigned by lot in each price range (from $20 a year for shorter pews in the back of the church to $200 a year for the six longest pews). Attendance following the construction of the new building must have been good, since on December 30 the vestry discussed extending the church west as far as the alley, adding ten rows of pews and enlarging the chancel, at a cost of approximately $7000, though no further action was taken on the proposal. Pew rental income totaled nearly $2800 in 1894/95, St. Chrysostom's first year of existence as a parish; a further $1450 was received in plate offerings and $2400 in pledges (made in response to appeals at Christmas and Easter rather than paid by weekly envelopes, which were probably not introduced until early in Norman Hutton's tenure as rector). By Easter Monday, 1895, finances had improved enough to allow Mr. Snively's salary to be raised to $3600 a year.

Parish records unfortunately do not contain copies of sermons or other material written by Mr. Snively. Occasional brief notes in the Tribune shed some light on his sermons and other activities. On Sunday, November 21, 1898, when announcing the time of the Thanksgiving services later in the week, Mr. Snively "paid his respects to football in the following language: 'These services are arranged at this hour so that the convenience of all may be considered. It is the one day when the church is recognized by the state. We are summoned by the civil authorities of both State and nation. It seems a better form of observance than the modern ordinance of football. There are some of our younger Americans who seem to think that Thanksgiving day was set apart for the special use of this game of questionable benefit. It is probably a noble form of athletics carried to an extreme. But the propriety and duty of religious observance of this day none can question." A year later, on November 22, 1899, Mr. Snively was the preacher at the north side Chicago Diocesan Choir Association Thanksgiving festival service at St. James Church.

On May 30, 1899, Mr. Snively's sermon at the annual diocesan convention touched on two issues of concern to the church. Questions of Biblical interpretation and criticism were frequently raised at this period, and shortly before the convention the Reverend Edward Larrabee of the Church of the Ascension had introduced in his parish "Prayers at Mass," a book of prayers described in the May 22 Tribune as having "no parallel in the United States outside of Roman Catholic churches."[7] As described in the Tribune of May 31, Mr. Snively's convention sermon "made a moving plea for a new book of common prayer and alluded to the book recently adopted by Father Larrabee"; unfortunately, the sentences quoted in that feature do not enlighten the present-day reader as to Mr. Snively's opinions on either topic. "The revelation and all that is involved in the incarnation is a trust that is reposed in God's church and her ministry. A profound struggle concerning the meaning of the holy scriptures has been seen in our age, but no greater than at any other time. There must be no assumption of theories, but a careful guarding of facts. The church is the keeper and guardian of the faith. The word of God contains mysteries that we must guard as stewards. We need to guard, too, the formalities of worship."

Little information on parish activities is available for the early years. Services were held at 8:00 and 11:00 a.m., with Holy Communion celebrated at 8:00 and at the 11:00 service on the first Sunday of the month, a pattern that would be maintained for over ninety-five years. During the fall, winter and spring an evening service was scheduled, the time of which seems to have varied between 4 or 4:30 p.m. and 7:45 or 8 p.m. Sunday School met at 9:40 a.m.; a children's festival service was scheduled on Easter Sunday afternoon, at which Sunday School awards and choir medals were presented. A piano was purchased for the school in 1897, and a vacation Bible school was held on at least one occasion (vestry minutes of October 1898 record that an "entertainment" raised over $500 for the school). Newberry Hall was the leader of an active Brotherhood of St. Andrew chapter, which was responsible for ushering at the early service and in the evening. (This men's group, founded at Chicago's St. James Church, sought to follow the example of the apostle Andrew in bringing new members to the church and welcoming visitors.)

St. Chrysostom's services often appeared in the Tribune listings of Christmas and Easter religious services and music in the 1890s. From this source we learn that on April 5, 1896, William Snively was the guest preacher at Easter services in his brother's parish. The following day's Tribune marks the first occasion on which the parish was mentioned in the Easter society news: "St. Chrysostom's Church, although plainly decorated, was fair to see. The font was filled with palms and lilies." Though "Easter costumes were conspicuous by their absence in many cases," the outfits of twelve women present (including Mrs. John R. Adams, Mrs. Franklin Beckwith, Mrs. Joseph T. Bowen, Mrs. H.R. Durkee, Mrs. Percy Fuller and Mrs. William Street) were described in detail. Nine years later, on April 24, 1905, the Tribune referred to St. James Church as "the objective point of many of the processions in the fashionable quarter" for the previous day's Easter observances, but continued, "Dividing the honors were St. Chrysostom's Church, where the Rev. Thaddeus Snively preached, and the Fourth Presbyterian."

A Ladies' Society existed by February 1894, since the building fund committee made a presentation before the group. The December 1, 1895 Tribune described the "fashionable bazaar" to take place three days later "from 3 to 10 o'clock at the residence of Mrs. Edward H. Valentine, No. 449 North State street, by the Women's Guild of St. Chrysostom's Church for the building fund of the church ... The previous bazaars given by the Women's Guild have been uniformly attractive and the coming one promises to equal, if not surpass, its predecessors." At the vestry meeting of December 20, Mr. Snively indicated that he planned a written expression of his gratitude for the group's "valuable help"; according to the parish's financial report, the bazaar made a profit of $1131, and in the following year a holiday fair at the home of Mrs. William Walker, 40 Banks Street, raised $750 for the church. As described in Tribune society page coverage, the bazaars adopted a color scheme -- red, green, blue, yellow, pink, lavender -- for many of the tables; other booths included baby and doll tables, a grab bag, a paper table, "utility" and "visiting" tables, and food -- candy, cake and frappé.  There was also entertainment; in 1895 the Misses Irene and Louise Hibbard gave whistling and recitations, and the 1896 bazaar featured "the first appearance in Chicago of the boy tenor, Master Walter Peabody of Detroit, who sang several solos."

The December 3, 1899 Tribune contained a lengthy feature on "one of the social events of the season as well as one of the prettiest sales of the year," to be held four days later at the home of Mrs. Thomas R. Lyon at 72 Astor Street. "The bazaar is being organized for the benefit of the church, with the expectation that its proceeds will assist materially in wiping out the church debt. A large number of the best known women on the North Side are interested in it and are assisting in person at the tables as well as giving the ten articles to which each woman in the parish is pledged." The color scheme plan of previous bazaars was to be followed, and other "attractive features" would include "an Oriental tearoom, with all the women in Japanese costume, a palmist, a grab bag, and an electric theater for the entertainment of the children."

Among the women taking active part in the bazaars were  wives and daughters of several vestry members of the period B Mrs. Henry Durkee, Mrs. Joseph Bowen, Mrs. J.H. Chew and Miss Chew, Mrs. W.D.C. Street, Mrs. John Russell Adams and Miss Adams, Mrs. E.J. Martyn and Miss Hazel Martyn, Mrs. William Warren, Miss Kasson. Nannie Beckwith, manager of the 1899 bazaar, had given the silver stand for the service book, while Martha Deane, secretary of that year's bazaar, would in 1934 describe her memories of early Guild activity in the special issue of the diocesan magazine commemorating the parish's fortieth anniversary.[8] Other women whose names appear in early parish records are Etta Quincy, who with her husband had contributed the baptismal font; Aurelia Senn, who donated a new organ to the church in 1897; Della Conover, in whose memory part of the cloister was later given; and Bertha Duppler (later Bertha Baur), who remained an active parishioner at St. Chrysostom's for over sixty years.

Perhaps the Kimball organ was inadequate, or a salary of $600 a year insufficient for "the great Campanino"; in January 1896 the vestry approved purchase of a $1265 Hook and Hastings organ and hired S. Wesley Martin as organist at a salary of $1000 a year. This organ too seems to have proved unsatisfactory. An 1897 vestry meeting approved authorization for estimates for "a large organ motor if necessary, also to remedy the noise which the present one makes"; on September 14 Aurelia Senn (wife of the physician Nicholas Senn for whom Senn High School is named) wrote to the vestry's music committee stating that she had "for some time been desirous of showing in a practical way my interest in the welfare of your Church" and had "decided to present you with a new Organ ... contracted on my own personal account with the W.W. Kimball Company ... costing $6000." She had considered a "Chime of Bells," but "being assured that the Edifice was in no shape to receive ... an addition," opted instead for the organ. (Nearly thirty years later, a much more elaborate "Chime of Bells" would be installed when Richard T. Crane, Jr. donated the 43-bell carillon.) The organ, after a major renovation in 1922, remained in use until 1953; John Redmond, at a 1952 vestry meeting discussing replacement of the organ, stated that it had originally been built for the 1893 World's Fair.

After discussion at the March and April 1896 meetings, the vestry concluded that "a system of rotation in office in the Vestry is expedient and desirable and that definite action toward that end be recommended for the coming year." This is the first reference to an issue which would be raised again at intervals over the next sixty years, although no further action was taken at the time. Norman Hutton proposed a rotating vestry in the early 1920s, and in late 1931 and early 1932 the vestry themselves drafted a rotation plan; Dudley Stark, favoring continuity of leadership in the parish, took no action on their proposal. Robert Hall on coming to the parish in 1958 specified in his contract that a rotating vestry would be introduced in the parish, and a rotation plan was approved at the 1960 annual meeting, sixty-four years after it had first been suggested.

One of the earliest extant records of a service at St. Chrysostom's is that of the "Sunday School Xmas Tree Service" on Wednesday, December 30, 1896, at 7:30 p.m. Three of the hymns sung at that service are still in use nearly a century later: "Once in Royal David's City," "Hark the Herald Angels Sing," and "As with Gladness Men of Old." The service included an address by the rector followed by "presentation of gifts of the Sunday School children," presumably gifts brought by them to give to children in need. "After this," reads the bulletin, "the candy will be given out. There is to be perfect order in the distribution, followed by singing Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow."

The years 1896 and 1897 saw the untimely deaths of three active members of the parish. Clerk of the vestry H. Newberry Hall died of appendicitis in February 1896 at the age of only thirty-two, leaving a widow and two small sons. The resolution adopted by the vestry after his death makes clear the loss which must have been felt: Dr. Hall is described as "ever seeking to make the stranger and the acquaintance welcome in God's House ... always ready to give sympathy and interest to the young men of our congregation. We have lost a brother, a wise counsellor and a prudent advisor." 

In November of the same year thirty-nine-year-old Percival Fuller died unexpectedly of pneumonia. "In the time when we were trying our strength to decide whether we could enter upon the life of a full-time Parish, he contributed sympathy, help, wisdom and courage," read the vestry resolution. "The names of Percival Fuller and of his family are among those, to whom this Church owes its start, when such aid was real sacrifice ... His death came to us with tremendous suddenness. Just as a new life -- a son, who is to bear the same honored name -- brought joy to the household and to the hearts of his friends, his earthly work was ended and he was called to rest. The house of gladness was transformed into the house of mourning." The death of Mr. Fuller's mother only a few days later added to the sadness. 

A few months later, in April 1897, vestry member Edward J. Martyn died of kidney disease at the age of fifty-one, survived by his wife and two daughters. The vestry praised "the remarkable part, which he had in the organization of our Parish and in making possible the present place and growth of our Church. Under the Providence of God, it was his brilliant genius that devised the plan by which a beginning seemingly of almost hopeless difficulty was made and a movement thus begun which has been crowned with exceptional success ... With a judgment most wise and a foresight most keen, was combined an enthusiasm very contagious and a courteous consideration for the opinions of others ... The qualities that gave him prominence and power in large commercial undertakings were consecrated ... to the development of our small Mission work into a metropolitan Parish."

The deaths of these men were a financial as well as a personal loss to the parish, since in case of the death of a contributor to the building fund the heirs were not held liable for the remaining part of the pledge. Messrs. Fuller and Martyn had been the largest contributors to the fund, and Dr. Hall's contribution, though smaller, would surely still have been missed.  (Persons moving out of the city were still responsible for pledge payments; a comment at the March 1896 vestry meeting indicates that it was necessary to remind an unidentified person who had left Chicago that pledge obligations were not canceled under such circumstances.)

The church building suffered some damage in a fire on Sunday, December 19, 1898; financial data from the 1899 annual meeting give the cost of repairs at $7324, but parish archives indicate that damage was not serious. On Christmas night, a considerably more extensive fire occurred at the Church of the Ascension. A December 27 Tribune feature, "CHURCH FIRES A MYSTERY," raised the possibility of arson in the Ascension and St. Chrysostom's fires and an earlier fire at Fourth Presbyterian Church on October 29: "There are no electric wires [at St. Chrysostom's] and no furnace where the fire started. The sole gas jet in the room, which was lighted, was found intact. The fire, after burning the wooden partition and floor of the auditorium, caused a gas meter to explode. The cause was first assigned to 'spontaneous combustion,' but as the room was empty save for a work bench and a few tools, that theory has been rejected. The members of the church have set the origin down as one of the mysteries.  D.R. [sic] Durkee of St. Chrysostom's vestry said, while he did not believe in the theory of incendiarism, it was hard to see how the fire could have started in any other way." The interior of the Church of the Ascension was severely damaged and for some time the church could not be used for services; Ascension accepted the invitation of St. Chrysostom's to hold its 7 a.m. Mass there until its building was repaired.

Several gifts were made to the parish in the late 1890s. Vestry minutes of October 25, 1897 record the gift of a "handsome Alter [sic] Cloth" by "Mrs. Catherwood of Philadelphia" (possibly the white altar frontal which has been used in recent years at Christmas and Easter services). In 1899 Mrs. John Alden Spoor presented the parish with a silver Communion set including the very large silver ewer (first used in 1899) and the red glass cruet and small silver cruet for wine and water, first used on Easter Sunday, April 15, 1900. (Both cruets were originally in glass; the original clear glass broke in the late 1960s and was replaced by silver. Two silver patens which were part of the gift, though not currently in use, remain in the church's possession; the matching chalices were probably those stolen in a 1932 burglary.)

Though no information exists of the exact date of its installation, the pulpit, designed by the Gorham Company and given in memory of George Walker Meeker, was probably first used at about this time. Mr. Meeker, forty-one years old, died on April 20, 1899, after a three-week illness identified as "catarrh of the stomach, which developed into a complication of illnesses." His father Arthur was the founder of the wholesale coal dealers A.B. Meeker and Company, and George Meeker was at the time of his death employed by that firm's successor, E.L. Hedstrom Company. A Chicago native and an 1879 graduate of Yale University, he was described in an April 21 Chicago Times-Herald obituary as "prominent in social and business circles ... an enthusiastic university man ... universally esteemed." He had been proposed as a member of the vestry in early 1899 but had refused election to that body. He was survived by his widow, Louise Ackerman Meeker, and two children, seven-year-old Margaret and five-year-old Lawrence, who remained active members of the parish; Lawrence Meeker served on the vestry in the early years of Norman Hutton's tenure as rector, and Margaret Meeker was married at St. Chrysostom's in 1914.[9] 

The lectern, a memorial to Joseph Kirkbride Milnor (a salesman who died in 1892) was also given at this period. According to an article in the February 1904 issue of the Diocese of Chicago magazine, the lectern, also manufactured by Gorham, had been exhibited by that company at the World's Fair of 1893. (The lectern which it replaced was donated to Christ Church, Woodlawn.) 

For reasons now unknown, Joseph Bowen resigned as junior warden in 1898, probably transferring his membership back to St. James, where the family had worshipped prior to the founding of St. Chrysostom's.[10] John Chew was elected as his successor. In 1901 when Henry Durkee (again for reasons unknown) resigned as senior warden, Dr. Chew became senior warden and William Street was chosen junior warden. The two men would continue in their positions for a record length of time, Dr. Chew serving as senior warden for twenty-three years until his death in 1924 and Mr. Street as junior warden for seventeen years until his death in 1918; these records will almost certainly never be surpassed, since canon law now places four-year limits on the terms of wardens.

Stained glass windows in each man's memory were dedicated on April 17, 1927. Dr. Chew is commemorated by the window in the south aisle representing St. Mark. The day's bulletin described  him as "eminent for his piety and devotion to the cause of Christ; a gentleman, a crusader in every worthy cause and a citizen of high repute." The small representation of the Judgment of Solomon in this window is said to typify his character, and almost certainly alludes to some of the difficult decisions he faced in his twenty-three years as senior warden. A contemporary cartoon in a book published early in the century depicting well-known Chicagoans shows him listening to a harried father at the other end of a telephone wire: "Come quickly 'Doc', baby's sick."

The St. John the Baptist window in the south aisle was given in memory of Mr. Street, "a founder of the Parish ... conspicuous for his sound business judgment and standing in the forefront of the Banking profession," whose "Christian life was held in high esteem by his contemporaries." The small stag in the window symbolizes his kindness and gentleness; the altar, his dedication to the church, while the angel with a model of the church refers to his activity as founder of the parish. The window contains a representation of the seal of the diocese, appropriate for a member of a family well known for two generations in the Episcopal church in the diocese of Chicago. William Street and his brother Charles were the sons of a priest who had emigrated from Canada to Iowa before the Civil War; both men later came to Chicago. Charles Street, for many years a vestry member and warden at St. James Church, had served on the finance committee of the original St. James Mission. His second wife Rosalind was a sister of Edward Larrabee, for many years rector of the Church of the Ascension. Their son Charles Larrabee Street was elected suffragan bishop of the diocese in 1949; Robert Howell recalled Bishop Street's comment that he particularly enjoyed his visitations to St. Chrysostom's because of his family's ties to the parish. William Street's wife Emily also belonged to a family of some note in the diocese; she was the sister of Harry Pardee of St. Chrysostom's 1893 finance committee and of the Reverend Luther Pardee, for many years a priest in the diocese.

S. Wesley Martin resigned as organist and choirmaster in 1902 and was replaced by Charles E. Allum.[11]  (Mr. Allum and his brother George were later elected to the vestry; George Allum served for a short period as its clerk.) A few records of parish activities exist from this period. The 1903 Sunday school library catalogue survives; it included not only strictly religious literature, but Alice in Wonderland, the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen, and books by Louisa May Alcott and Horatio Alger.  Ben Hur, Vanity Fair and Richard III are marked with an asterisk as "suitable for older readers."  It is noted that "a large number of the volumes are not suitable for Sunday reading." 

By 1903, after nearly ten years of service, the church building was apparently in need of repair. A hardwood floor was installed in the basement, which was completely redecorated in time for fall activities, the costs being met with money raised by the Girls' Friendly Society, the Young Men's Club and the teachers in the Ministering Children's League; at this time the basement included a guild room also used by the Sunday School, and space for the infant school, choir and Women's Auxiliary. The Diocese of Chicago for February 1904 describes work done in the church itself later in 1903:

 

Christmas Day was exceptionally bright for the Rev. Thaddeus A. Snively, rector of S. Chrysostom's, Chicago, on account of the beautiful Christmas gift made to him by the active and generous planning of some of the congregation. It was due to the energy of two of the ladies of the congregation, though many responded to their appeal. Nine years of use had left the carpet of the church, and also the walls looking rather shabby and worn, and the plan was to give the rector a Christmas surprise by having a new carpet laid and the walls decorated before Christmas.

It was necessary to consult him officially, and also thoughtfully to learn his preferences, and thus the surprise was for him ten days before Christmas when he was told that the work was to be done at once, and thoroughly, and without any burden of anxiety as to the ways and means for the rector or the vestry.

And it was well carried out.  The work began December 16, and completed on Christmas Eve in time for the Christmas decorations. When it is remembered that this was accomplished in seven working days, that it included the cleaning of all the walls, their treatment ... and the laying on of the rich color, and that every seat had to be moved three times (and some carried out of the church) for the taking up of the old carpet, the cleaning of the floor and finally the laying of the new carpet, it will appear to everyone as an unusual exhibition of energy applied to things ecclesiastical.

The nave ... is carpeted in a red ingrain, while in the chancel and the broad aisle of the choir there is a red velvet carpet.

All the kneeling pads of the church were re-covered in a plush of a color in harmony with the rich tint of the walls.[12]  It seems scarcely possible that so small a change as color properly applied (though only in one tone) could make such a great improvement ...  At the same time the vestry room was re-colored ... and a beautiful Wilton rug placed there.  The total expenditure was more than $1,000.

The redecoration of the church must have been welcomed by Edward Martyn's older daughter Hazel, whose wedding to New York doctor Edward Trudeau (son of the founder of the tuberculosis sanitarium at Saranac Lake, N.Y.) took place at St. Chrysostom's on the twenty-eighth of the month. Chicago newspapers devoted considerable space to the wedding and its attendant festivities. Hazel Martyn was artistically talented; the newspapers recorded that her husband's gift to her was an etching press and that the couple's apartment in New York was fitted out with a studio for her work. The younger Martyn daughter Dorothy, still in her early teens, was maid of honor at the ceremony. Newspaper accounts of the decoration of the church make the first known reference to the large wooden crosses topped with candles, still used at the ends of the pews at Christmastide and for weddings.[13]  Two days later, on December 30, the entire city was shocked by the Iroquois Theater tragedy. Over six hundred persons were killed during a matinee when a fire in the scenery spread rapidly through the building; no exits were marked, a number of the doors were locked, and many persons were either trampled to death or died of smoke inhalation. Among the deceased was sixty-year-old St. Chrysostom's parishioner Fanny Guthrie Meriam, who had been attending the theater with forty-year-old Mrs. Elizabeth Duvall and Mrs. Duvall's daughter Sarah (possibly Mrs. Meriam's daughter and granddaughter) who also died in the fire. "DEATH ENDS A USEFUL LIFE," read her obituary in the January 3, 1904 Tribune, the day after her funeral at St. Chrysostom's.

Mrs. Henry Howard Meriam ... was an active worker in church and club circles. She was prominent in the parishes of the Church of Our Saviour and St. Chrysostom's, and belonged to societies in both. She was vice president of the Illinois State Federation of Women's Clubs, president of the Alternate Club, member of the Lake View Woman's Club, chairman of the board of directors of the Home for the Aged ... in all of which she made herself valuable because of her executive abilities. She had won success as a lecturer, and her final public appearance was at St. James' parish house on Dec. 10 in a stereopticon lecture on 'Famous Bell Towers' for the benefit of the Home for the Aged of the Episcopal church ... She was a woman of high intellectual ability and rare social attainments, and her loss will be felt by a large circle of friends.

1903 was probably the year of the first of a series of annual fairs sponsored by the Young Men's Club ("all Young Men of good character are cordially invited to come down and meet the boys") and the Girls' Friendly Society (which welcomed "all Young Ladies of respectable character"). Though no information on the 1903 fair survives, parish archives contain programs from the second and third annual fairs of 1904 and 1905. The fairs were held on three evenings and included a raffle and a variety of entertainment: monologues, recitations and musical numbers (the Day Dream Orchestra performed in 1904; we do not know if this was a parish group or hired for the occasion). The major feature was a comic one-act play performed by members of the parish. The 1905 production, Who Is Who, or, All in a Fog, had a plot hinging on the confusion between a man hired as a "gentleman's gentleman" by the father of the house and a suitor calling upon the daughter. These fairs mark the first recorded instances of dramatic and musical entertainment at St. Chrysostom's; through the years plays, play reading groups and musical programs have remained popular parish activities.

An invitation to the "3rd Annual Minstrel and Social," (admission charge, twenty-five cents), held February 5, 1907, also survives in the archives. Minstrel shows with their blackface performers would not be acceptable today, but in those years were a popular form of entertainment. (A sample joke from a minstrel show at the Church of the Epiphany, quoted in John Henry Hopkins' history, may be cited: "'Mr. Bones': What did the rector say when he fell off his bicycle in front of Epiphany Church?  'End-man': I don't know, what?  'Mr. Bones': Here endeth the second lesson.")

The February 1904 Diocese of Chicago article quoted earlier contained an optimistic assessment of parish finances: all debt had been paid but the present $5,000 mortgage, and "as the property and gifts represent a value of $5,000, the congregation which is not large nor wealthy has every reason for feeling that Christmas, 1903, was not only a very bright day for the rector but also for every member of the congregation." These comments would be proved inaccurate in the ensuing years. Although the annual meeting of 1902 had reported that nearly $6000 in pew rents had been received during the year, mention had also been made of a decline in revenues. The following year's annual meeting lists under "liabilities" in the budget "five months salary to rector." Vestry minutes of the period allude continually to financial problems; committees were frequently appointed to investigate the situation and reports received, but there are no indications of action which may have been taken. (It is possible that the vestry disagreed on possible courses of action, since at this time and shortly afterward there seems to have been some dissension among the group.) 

By June 1905 the parish had borrowed $5000, probably using part of the sum to pay the salary still owing Mr. Snively, and in April 1906 the vestry was unwillingly forced to accept the rector's recommendation that his salary be reduced from $3600 to $2400 a year. At this meeting the wardens agreed to meet with Bishop Charles P. Anderson to discuss the church's problems and "find ways to increase interest and attendance"; a letter was also sent to the parishioners (unfortunately, no information on either the bishop's recommendations or the letter and possible response from parishioners survives). By 1907 the situation was so bad that the parish budget could not cover the $225 due on the mortgage; the Young Men's Club and the Girls' Friendly Society (possibly using the proceeds from another annual fair) were fortunately willing and able to make the payment.

Mr. Snively, in the circumstances, had apparently become discouraged. Now fifty-six years old, he had lived through difficult situations in both church and personal life, and may have felt unready to begin the process of rebuilding the church he had helped to establish some fourteen years earlier. On April 11, 1907, he submitted in writing his resignation to the vestry.

 

After long and serious thought, I have decided that the time has come for my laying down the honor of the rectorship of this Parish.  The Lent and Easter just past, brought to a close my fifteenth winter in this work.

In that time, since I began the mission service, many blessings and many sorrows have come to me, and there are manifold close bonds of affection and gratitude binding me in memory to this dear Parish.

To take this step is for me one of the most severe decisions of life.

He pointed out that the parish remained free of floating debt through Easter and that the insurance was paid through December 1907, and expressed his gratitude for the offer of the Young Men's Club and the Girls' Friendly Society to make the mortgage payment. His original plan was to resign as of May 1, but he indicated that he would remain until July 1 if necessary and did in fact stay on until that date; the vestry, however, refused to accept his request that his salary be reduced to $100 a month for the remainder of his time at St. Chrysostom's. According to a Chicago Tribune story of April 16, 1907, "many of the parishioners believe the growth and prosperity of the church to have been the direct results of Mr. Snively's untiring zeal and labor," and a number of older parishioners urged him to reconsider his decision.

An unidentified newspaper clipping from Maude Snyder's collection gives a somewhat different account of the resignation, and seems to indicate a state of mind which in the 1990s might be described as "burnout."

 

QUITS HIS PULPIT IN DISGUST.

The Rev. T.A. Snively Says Sunday Golf and Autos Thin Flock.

The Rev. Thaddeus A. Snively, disgusted because society people appear to him to be more fond of automobiling, golf and country outings on Sunday than attendance at church services, has resigned the rectorship of St. Chrysostom's Episcopal Church, 544 Dearborn avenue. His church being one of the most fashionable in the city, a falling off in attendance from these causes is said by him to have been marked.

Mr. Snively built up St. Chrysostom's Church from an abandoned mission ... to a flourishing parish ... The religious enthusiasm of the pastor and his charm and personality, with the aid of devoted church workers, had begun to accomplish wonders when the attraction of beautiful suburbs and outdoor recreations caused a halt in the plans. Now Mr. Snively ... declares he wants to give way to a younger man.

"It seems the whole world is going pleasure mad," Mr. Snively is quoted as having said last night. "First it was the bicycle fad, then golf, and now it is automobiling, golf and Sunday house parties. Whether my parish has been harder hit by these fads than other parishes or districts is more than I can say, but I am inclined to think so. However, fifteen years in one pastorate is a long time and I need a rest."

Dr. John H. Chew ... a warden of St. Chrysostom's  church, does not subscribe to the theory that spiritual welfare is being neglected by the rich more than before the advent of automobiles. "Former members of the congregation who have left us to live along the beautiful north shore I am sure are not neglected spiritually ... Notwithstanding the attractions of outdoor and country life for the rich, it must not be inferred that religious worship is forgotten."

 

The news story is one of the earliest references to St. Chrysostom's image as a fashionable parish: an oversimplification both then and now. Although a number of members of the congregation have through the years been known for their civic and social activities, there have also been many who have not come from a "society" background (Frederick Spalding, who began work at fourteen, is a case in point), and parishioners such as wardens John Chew and William Street were apparently known as much for their activity in good causes and for their Christian lives as for their social status. 

Another recurring theme is the loss of parishioners to the suburbs, probably motivated less by the pleasures of "automobiling, golf and Sunday house parties" than by the desire of young families to bring up their children in a suburban environment. Fortunately during the history of the parish there have always been families who have remained in the city and been active at St. Chrysostom's; frequently, too, suburban residents moving to the city after their children have grown have become members of the parish. The parish has also throughout its history been home to many people not part of traditional families who have put their talents to use in its service, so that it has remained strong and active despite the loss of some members to the suburbs over the years.

The stained glass window in the chapel given in Mr. Snively's memory some twenty years after his departure took for its subject the prophet Job. (Its donor, Henry Bannard,  president of a brewery in the early years of the century, made a special point of recording not only his religion but also his membership at St. Chrysostom's in his biography in the 1905 edition of The Book of Chicagoans.) The bulletin on the date of its dedication (November 29, 1928) states that the yellow tunic, blue mantle and touches of red in Job's garments symbolize suffering, loyalty and self-sacrifice. "Above him is the Heavenly Crown of Stars; beneath, a Tiger intersected by the rays of a Star. These two symbols in conjunction suggest Faith overcoming Pain ... The entire composition of these windows intends to symbolize one who displayed courage, patience, fortitude and a devoted Christian manhood throughout a life of affliction."