Methodist Church

Yann Street, Preston

Built 1880 George Fincham for Methodist Church, Auburn (Hawthorn)
Installed at Preston 1889
Removed 1967 George Fincham & Sons Pty Ltd (parts used elsewhere)
2 manuals, 12 speaking stops, 3 couplers, mechanical action



Methodist Church, Yann Street, Preston – exterior from south-west
(photograph by T.W. Cameron from State Library of Victoria)


Historical and Technical Documentation by John Maidment
© OHTA, February 2022


The new Wesleyan Church in Yann Street, Preston was opened on 29 September 1889. The architect was the accomplished Alfred Dunn (who died in 1894 at the age of 29 resulting from tuberculosis). The building was constructed in Camberwell and Northcote bricks in the Gothic style with a spire 124 feet high. The internal seating was arranged in a horseshoe form.1,2 The building was sold by the Uniting Church in 1967 and is now SS Cyril and Methodius Greek Orthodox Church.



Methodist Church, Yann Street, Preston – organ
(photograph from the Uniting Church Archives, Victoria)

The organ was built by George Fincham for the former Methodist Church at the corner of Burwood Road and William Street, Auburn. The cost was £337 pounds and it was opened on 20 September 1880 by David Lee.3

The Auburn church was demolished and the congregation moved to a new site in Oxley Road nearby, where a far larger church was erected (also designed by Alfred Dunn). The 1880 Fincham organ was sold to the Preston church:

A very useful organ has been purchased at a satisfactory price and far below its value, the price paid being about £250; this was accomplished by arrangement, the Hawthorn Church being the former owners of the instrument, which was sold to make way for a larger one.4

The specification remained unaltered at the time of its removal in 1967:

GREAT
Open Diapason
Stopped Diapason
Claribel
Keraulophon
Principal
Flute
Swell to Great
8
8
8
8
4
4

CC-BB
TC
TC




  
SWELL
Open Diapason
Stopped Diapason
Principal
Fifteenth
Mixture
Oboe


8
8
4
2
2 ranks
8







 
PEDAL
Bourdon
Great to Pedal
Swell to Pedal5
16



 

The organ was removed from the building in 1967 by Geo. Fincham & Sons Pty Ltd. Some parts were used elsewhere but the fine case was lost.

1,2 The Argus, 2 October 1889, p.11; Mercury and Weekly Courier 3 October 1889, p.2

3 The Argus, 28 September 1880, p.4

4 Mercury and Weekly Courier 3 October 1889, p.2

5 Specification from E.N. Matthews