Bio: Meyer, Caroline (Organist for 43 Years - 1953)

Contact: stan@wiclarkcountyhistory.org 

Surnames: Meyer, Varney, Thielen, Schofield, Soefker, Hoehne, Wessel, Busch

----Source: Greenwood Gleaner (Greenwood, Clark Co., Wis.) 24 Dec 1953

Meyer Caroline (Organist for 43 Years - 1953)

A Bible and a bouquet of roses and a cake with musical scale frosted in pink, were Zion Evangelical and Reformed congregation's gifts to Mrs. Adolph Meyer in recognition of her 43 years of continuous service to the church as organist and Sunday School teacher.

The gifts, a complete surprise to Mrs. Meyer, were presented at a recent special meeting of the congregation.

It was about this time of the year back in 1910 when Mrs. Meyer, then mother of three small sons, began as organist and Sunday School teacher at Zion Church. A year earlier she had taken over the office of treasurer of the Sunday School and the Zion Ladies Aid Society.

In those days the father worked in the woods a great deal of the time and it often became necessary for Mrs. Meyer to combine church duties and motherhood responsibilities. Her youngsters sometimes slept in the front pew of the church where she could peek at them from around or over the top of the organ. As the lads got older they adhered firmly to mother's lessons in church decorum.

Music came naturally to Mrs. Meyer, she said. When she was 16, then Caroline Soefker, she learned the fundamentals of organ playing from a younger sister, Mary, a student of Edith Varney, accomplished Greenwood musician. There was no organ in the household, so she practiced at the nearby Henry Thielen home. "At times I would practice finger exercises on the kitchen table," Mrs. Meyer said.

The Soefker family lived in the Town of Warner (Clark Co., Wis.), about 7 1/2 miles northwest of Greenwood. When she was 17, Mrs. Meyer began employment at the Schofield home in Greenwood. Mrs. Schofield, recognizing the talents, gave her lessons and encouraged her to practice on the organ and piano in the Schofield home. "The first two months I worked for my lessons, the I got $1.25 a week besides," Mrs. Meyer remarked.

She worked in the Schofield home for a year and a half and continued to advance in musical knowledge and skill. At 19 she returned to the Town of Warner to marry Adolph Meyer in 1899. The couple celebrated their golden wedding anniversary in May 1949. Mr. Meyer died the following year. While still a resident of Warner, Mrs. Meyer occasionally played the organ in the West Side Immanuel Evangelical and Reformed there.

In 1903 the family moved to Greenwood. Mrs. Meyer still occupies the original homestead. A son, Gilbert, also make his home there. Other sons are Orlando, who lives in Cameron, and Elmer, Chicago.

Mrs. Meyer became active in the work of Zion Church immediately after it was organized. She and the Mrs. C.C. Hoehne formed the first Sunday School classes in 1909. The same year she took over the office of treasurer of the Sunday School and the Zion Ladies Aid Society.

Her treasured possessions include a small book with meticulous accounts of aid society finances and attendance dating back to 1909. "I ran out of pages in 1926 and had to buy a new book," she commented humorously.

She withdrew as treasurer of the aid society after serving more than a quarter century in that office, but the Sunday School accounts still are in her keeping.

Joyce Meyer, granddaughter and a Greenwood High School senior, now helps her grandmother with Sunday School classes, and Mrs. Adolph Wessel and Miss Jeanette Busch have taken over as organist, but when the occasion demands, Mrs. Meyer is available for the duties she handled so long and so conscientiously.