Amsterdam:
Emily Devendorf—Poet, community leader
By Bob Cudmore, Focus on History, Daily Gazette, 1-22-05
“For the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible.”
Chorus of Easter Anthem by Emily Devendorf, published 1876
Emily Vandermeer Youngs Devendorf wrote poetry and music and was active in Amsterdam’s community life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Her name came up last year in a column on the history of the Sanford Home for Elderly Women on Guy Park Avenue. In 1896, Devendorf had written a poem to raise funds for an earlier home for elderly women on Mohawk Place: “I’ve been thinking dear friends; it would not be bad to make the old ladies the fash’nable ‘fad.’”
Emily’s husband was G. Smith Devendorf, an attorney with an office at 45 East Main Street. The Devendorfs had no children and lived at 40 Division Street, near St. Ann’s Episcopal Church where husband and wife were in the choir. G. Smith directed the group; Emily sang and composed music for the choir, including an Easter anthem privately published in 1876. In the anthem, the chorus sings: “For the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible.”
A copy of the sheet music for the anthem is a prized possession of Anne Vedder Hoffman DeGroff of Amsterdam, receptionist at the Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce and a member of St. Ann’s today. Only twenty copies of the anthem were printed. The copy DeGroff possesses belonged to her great grandparents, Dr. John Vedder Riggs and his wife Annie, members of the choir.
DeGroff, who is also related to the Devendorfs, said she was in awe when she once prevailed upon her piano teacher to play the piece: “First of all I don’t play the piano very well and it was very difficult. And I was in awe because of the number of sharps and flats.”
Emily Devendorf died in December 1906. In a column called “Gleanings of the man about town” in the Morning Sentinel newspaper of Amsterdam, the columnist printed a poem that Devendorf wrote in 1871 describing 12 members of the choir. The column also noted that “Mrs. Devendorf’s compositions” were sung at her funeral by the “old choir.”
Devendorf described herself in the poem as “a little Dutch woman—by name Emily.” She wrote of her husband, the choir director, that he was “a good detector of discords and everything else that’s wrong.”
Of Dr. Riggs, Devendorf wrote that “his voice is deep and tremendous strong and without him, we do not so well get along.” Annie Riggs, the doctor’s wife, she was frequently absent from the choir, singing instead for her baby “who came last spring.” Of merchant W. Max Reid, Devendorf wrote, “Next comes Max, who though not dealing in pills, sells coffins for all that the doctor kills.” Reid was the first president of the Board of Trade in 1884, the predecessor of today’s Chamber of Commerce.
Devendorf had these lines for a woman named Annie Catlin: “Now comes our alto—kind Mrs. Catlin. She’s one of the ladies not given to tattlin’.” Of Delia Roberts, Devendorf wrote: “What can I say more than that she is fair. In size she’s larger than any the rest. And I can assure you, she’s one of the best.”
Judge Martin L. Stover was the subject of a lawyer joke: “(He) pleads at the bar, but not for drink. No, no, not for that would I have you think. His voice it is good and I do declare that he and Jo are an excellent pair.” Joseph Roberts was Delia’s husband.
Edward H. Finlayson, the young man operating the blower for the pipe organ, received the following tribute: “But on him depends a very great deal. And if he chooses, he soon can reveal how quick he can put us all in a fix. For when he stops blowing, the music is—nix.”
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