Evening star., 1937-03-14
GIFT IS TRIBUTE
To NOTED SINGER
Emma Thursby's Sister
Provides for Morav!an
Seminary Music Building.

BETHLEHEM, Pa, March ia
rift of s125. 900 by Miss Ina l.. Thurs
bv Of New York City for the erection
Of music building at Moravian
Seminary and College for Women,
Bethlehem, Pa, in memory OF ner
sister Emma Cecilia Thursby, the
late noted coloratura soprano who
died July 4, 1881, was announced to-
day by DR.. Edwin J. Heath, president.
The building is to stand on the cam
pus of the institution, which Miss
Emma Thursby attended, with her
older sister Alice, from 1857 to 1860,
and is designed to serve not only
for the department of music, but also
as music center for the community
and a rehearsal hall for the Bach
Choir. The music building is the
first step in the bicentenary program
of which the next objective is $780,
900 additional endowment to meet
the requirements for full class A rat
ting for the college.
In making the gift, Miss Thursby
emphasized that she had long con-
sidered perpetuating her sisters
memory in some manner.
Records to Be Housed.
The building will house the records
Of Miss Emma Thursby's musical
career, and many gifts and mementos
which she had received during her
international tours. Among these
mementos are signed photographs
from King Oscar of Sweden and
King Christian OF Denmark, a bronze
plate given her by the leading musi-
clans Of France when she was well
coined to membership in the So
cietv OF Artist Musicians, the first
American singer so honored, after
one Of her great European triumphs
IN 1879, and countless letters and tes-
timonials from the greatest musicians
and personages of the nineteenth GEN.
tury
1t is planned that the Emma Ce-
ella Thursby Memorial Music Build
Ing will be placed on the lower part
of the campus, only a stones throw
from Colonial Hall, built in 1748,
which dates back almost to the found
ing OF Moravian Seminary in 1742
as the first boarding school for girls
in the American Colonies. 1t was
here that the daughters of John Jay,
first Chief Justice of the United States
Supreme Court, grandnieces of George
Washington and Thomas Jefferson,
and daughters of other leading fam
lilies such as the Greenes, Hunting
tons, Livingstons, Girards, Lorillards,
Roosevelts and Vanderbilts we're early
students. This new building will be
simple and dignified in design, in
architectural harmony with Colonial
Hall and other well-known Moravian
buildings.
OF Pennsylvania Stone.
The material will be native Penn
sylvania stone, and the same general
style Of this old Moravian architecture
also will be followed in other build
1ngs contemplated in the bicentenary
development program of the college,
looking toward the 20oth anniversary
In 1912.
1t was announced by r. S. Taylor
chairman of the Executive Committee
of the Board of Trustees, that plans
for the music building are being pre-
pared by the firm Of Theodore Wis.,
scher and James Burley of New York,
the architects of the institution and
of Lehigh University. and by Ger
trude Comfort Morrow. associate ar
Chitect of the firm of Morrow a. Nor
row, consulting architects on the
Golden Gate Bridge. The building
will contain class rooms, studios, Of
fces, museum. library and listening
rooms and a concert hall with a seat
ing capacity of 500, which also will be
used for dramatic performances. 1t
will be of especial interest to the Bach
Choir because from its inception the
choir has held its weekly rehearsals
in the chapel of the Moravian Sem
mary and College for Women, where
the first director of the choir. DR.. j.
Fred Wolfe. was born and brought
up, during the time his father, Rev.
Francis Wolfe, was head of the
school.
Miss Ina ThurSby is an honorary
alumna of Moravian College and also a
member of the Honorary Committee of
Its bicentenary fund, of which Eugene
G. Grace is chairman. Mrs. Sara
Delano Roosevelt and Mrs. August Bel
mont, both holders of honorary de-
grees from Moravian, are also mem
bers Of this committee