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© 2003 Mount Holyoke College. All rights reserved.
William Churchill Hammond was born November 25, 1860, in Rockville, Connecticut, to Joseph Churchill Hammond, Jr. and Katharine Isham Burr Hammond. He began his career as an organist in 1876 at the Second Congregational Church in Rockville and served in that position until 1884. Hammond also studied music with B.F. Leavens, N.H. Allen, and S.P. Warren in Hartford, Connecticut and New York City in 1876. In 1884, he played organ at the Pearl Street Congregational Church in Hartford, Connecticut. He went to Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1885 to play organ for the Second Congregational Church. He was there from 1885-1949 and also formed the choir at that church. In 1896, Hammond was a founder of the American Guild of Organists. He married Fanny Bliss Reed in 1898 and they had two sons, William Churchill Hammond, Jr. and Lansing Van der Heyden Hammond. Hammond was a music teacher in Holyoke and taught organ at Smith College from 1889-1899. He joined the faculty of Mount Holyoke College as a music professor in 1899. In 1924 Hammond took over direction of the Mount Holyoke Glee Club. He was also given an honorary degree of Doctor of Music by Mount Holyoke in that year. He remained at Mount Holyoke College until 1937. Hammond died on April 16, 1949, in Holyoke, Massachusetts, at the age of eighty-eight.
The William Churchill Hammond Papers consist of scrapbooks, correspondence, material relating to "White's Air" (a folksong that Hammond arranged for organ), music programs, biographical information, memorabilia, sound recordings, and photographs. The twenty scrapbooks dating from 1868-1950 and the music programs, 1896-1942, provide an overview of Hammond's life and work. In particular, these documents reflect his service as organist and choir director for the Second Congregational Church in Holyoke, Massachusetts, from 1885-1949; his work as a music professor, organist, and director of the Glee Club at Mount Holyoke College, 1899-1937; and his association with the American Guild of Organists, which he helped to establish. The scrapbooks also include information concerning both his family and the William Churchill Hammond Memorial Fund established by Mount Holyoke College after Hammond's death in 1949. Material in the collection relating to "White's Air" includes copies of the score, information about the song's history, and two copies of a sound recording of "White's Air" and "The March of the Magi Kings" performed by Hammond. Correspondence in the collection is limited to brief professional letters between Hammond and the Mount Holyoke College President's Office dating from the 1930s-1946. The photographs, circa 1903-1946 and 1964, consist of formal and informal photographs of Hammond alone and with others as well as several photographs of family members, including his son, William Churchill Hammond, Jr.
This collection is organized into eight series:
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Please use the following format when citing materials from this collection:
William Churchill Hammond Papers, Mount Holyoke College Archives and Special Collections, South Hadley, MA.
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The scrapbooks consists of twenty volumes dating from 1868-1950. Volumes one through nineteen were compiled during Hammond's lifetime. They date from 1868-1948 and document Hammond's professional and family life. They mainly include programs for his organ recitals at the Second Congregational Church and the Skinner Memorial Chapel in Holyoke, Massachusetts. The scrapbooks also contain other music programs, newspaper clippings, greeting cards, post cards, snapshots of family and friends, invitations, telegrams, some letters and envelopes, programs and memorabilia relating to many colleges and churches, class schedules, and some cancelled checks written by Hammond. Volume twenty, dating from 1934-1950, consists of a list of alumnae and friends who donated to the William Churchill Hammond Memorial Fund and a collection of cancelled checks that Hammond wrote to Mount Holyoke College.
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Hammond's correspondence consists of several letters that he sent to or received from the President's Office at Mount Holyoke College in the 1930s and in 1946. These letters chiefly invitations to play at Vesper Services at Commencement.
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"White's Air" is a folksong dating from the 1850s that Hammond arranged for the organ and played at the end of each Vesper Service at Mount Holyoke College. This series includes copies of the score for the song that he made to give to students between 1916-1931 and another handwritten copy of the score, with a detailed description of the song's history, that Hammond prepared in 1937. The series also contains a copy of the score published in 1949 and three articles about the song written in 1936, 1949, and 1962.
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The series chiefly consists of programs for concerts given by Hammond. They include programs for the celebration commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Hammond's service as organist of the Second Congregational Church in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1935; programs for his many other concerts at that church between 1896-1942; programs for organ recitals given by Hammond at Mount Holyoke College, 1898-1939; and programs for the New England Chapter of the American Guild of Organists recitals, 1908-1917. Many of the programs in this series are also filed in Hammond's scrapbooks in Series 1 of this collection.
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The biographical material chiefly includes newspaper articles regarding Hammond's recitals, anniversaries, tributes, and his obituary. The series includes the newspaper announcement of his wedding, pieces about his music and recitals, articles regarding his anniversaries at the Second Congregational Church in Holyoke, Massachusetts and Mount Holyoke College, articles in tribute to Hammond, and his obituaries.
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This series consists of invitations, programs, a certificate, a brochure, a music score, and a diploma. The invitations and programs concern concerts given by Hammond or in his honor at the Second Congregational Church in Holyoke, Massachusetts, between 1915-1945. The music score is for "Will's Air" by John Gilman Clark, written to commemorate Hammond's sixtieth anniversary as organist of that Church in 1945. The brochure was issued by Mount Holyoke College in May, 1949, to raise money for the William Churchill Hammond Memorial fund. The diploma and certificate of appreciation were given to Hammond by Mount Holyoke College in 1924, when he was awarded an honorary degree of music, and by the citizens of Springfield, Massachusetts, in about 1935.
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This series contains two copies of a 78 rpm sound recording of "White's Air" and "March of the Magi Kings." These albums are recordings of songs played at Mount Holyoke College with pipe organ solos by Hammond. The recordings probably date from the 1920s.
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The series consists of formal photographs, snapshots, and postcards of Hammond alone or with others, circa 1903-1948, and several photographs of Hammond family members. The photographs include those of Hammond with Mount Holyoke choir members and with visitors to the College. The series also includes photographs of Hammond with his children and grandchildren, a snapshot of his wife, Fanny Hammond, taken in 1964, and a photograph of their son, William Churchill Hammond, Jr., dating from about 1909.