Jeanie Little Castle died on September 9 in Mechanicsville, Virginia, at the age of 65. A graduate of Lynchburg College and Indiana University, she held a doctorate in organ literature and pedagogy from the University of Iowa, and did postgraduate studies at Oxford University. Her organ studies were with Clyde Holloway, Gerhard Krapf, and Delbert Disselhorst. Dr. Castle taught at Virginia Union University for 18 years. She was a member of the Organ Historical Society and the American Guild of Organists, which she served as Virginia state chairman. Jeanie Little Castle is survived by her husband, Capt. Ernest C. Castle, a sister, and three nieces.
M. Louise Miller died on August 14 in Wallingford, Connecticut. She was 94. A resident of Fairfield for 85 years, she was a graduate of Yale University School of Music, Trinity College of Music, London, and the School of Sacred Music at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Ms. Miller was music director-organist of B’nai Israel Temple of Bridgeport, and Minister of Music Emerita of First Congregational Church in Stratford, where she served for 45 years and had established the Stratford Oratorio Society, which presented concerts annually. She was a charter member and former dean of the Bridgeport AGO chapter, which honored her in 1998 with the establishment of the M. Louise Miller Scholarship Award; she herself had established the AGO’s Clarence Dickinson Scholarship in 2001. Louise Miller is survived by two nieces and several grand nieces and nephews.
Barron Smith died on September 1 in San Carlos, California at the age of 81. He gave his first piano recital at age five and first organ recital at eleven; he was accepted at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia as the youngest organ student in the school’s history, and at age 19 was appointed to the Westminster Choir College faculty, as one of the youngest university faculty members in the country. He served the music ministries of numerous churches, in Florida, Pennsylvania, and California, including the Church of the Epiphany (Episcopal) in San Carlos. He concertized in the U.S. and Europe, and recorded four albums, one of which was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1957. Barron Smith is survived by his wife, Ruth.
J. Rodney Yarbrough, 71, died November 15 in his boyhood home at Celina, Texas. He attended North Texas State College (now University of North Texas) and paid for his schooling by making “mirror” pianos, which consisted of taking an old upright piano, cutting away the top part of the case, and enclosing the exposed frame and strings in mirrors, giving the piano a more “modern” appearance.
Rodney was a great fan of theatre organs. It was in this connection that I got to know him and he “Tom Sawyered” me into helping him remove a large Wurlitzer from the Aztec Theater in San Antonio to his family home in Celina. We decided to set up an organ business partnership, which we called Jahrmann Organs, a name combining the first of his last name and the last of mine, re-spelled to suggest a German provenance. Rodney and I quickly determined that we didn’t know enough to do the kind of work we aspired to, so we moved to Austin to apprentice with the late Otto Hofmann, a pioneer in the revival of the classic organ in America. Two years later I went my own way, and Rodney returned to Celina and became a partner with Robert L. Sipe, working as Sipe-Yarbrough and located in Dallas. The firm had already achieved some notable instruments, including the organ in St. Stephen’s United Church in Mesquite, Texas, when Rodney was the victim of an automobile accident, which left him paralyzed from the neck down.
He lived thereafter in Celina with his parents, George Ted and Jessie Yarbrough, until their deaths, and then under the care of his long-time friend, Francis Adams. He maintained a wide circle of friends and acquaintances, especially those who shared his interest in theatre organs. He often worked as an unpaid consultant for theatre organ installations. Rodney is survived by his cousins: Bonnie O’Dell of Celina, Texas; LaVerne Rose of Van, Texas; Dorothy Cason and Sur Paddock of Ft. Worth, Texas. His ashes were placed at Cottage Hill Cemetery in Celina, Texas November 21, 2008.
—George Bozeman
