Scot Huntington on September 12th, 2020:
The congregation was formed in 1845 and built their first structure on this site. It was razed in 1876 to make way for a large brick church which took 6 years to complete while funding trickled in. The church sat 500 and was the largest in town, with a grand steeple over 150 feet tall. The organ is listed on the Hook & Hastings second-hand list, with no identification of the original builder. On Sunday morning, March 1, 1891 at 10 am just as the bell began to ring for Sunday services, smoke began to pour out of the cellar. The church became consumed quickly, and burned to the ground. An overheated chimney from the furnace was the final conclusion for the source of the fire. The church rebuilt with a much smaller building on the same site, which was dedicated in May 1892, one year later to the day. The new building contained an organ built by J.W. Steere and Sons in 1892, still extant. A history of the town of Salem, long out of print, contains a fuzzy photograph of the interior. The organ had a three-sectional gothic case, and was in a front gallery with several rows of choir pews, above and behind the black walnut pulpit, which was saved from the fire and is still in use.