{"id":116596,"date":"2023-03-04T13:07:41","date_gmt":"2023-03-04T18:07:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=116596"},"modified":"2023-03-04T13:07:41","modified_gmt":"2023-03-04T18:07:41","slug":"james-blain-beam-eastons-music-man-of-the-early-20th-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/?p=116596","title":{"rendered":"James Blain Beam | Easton\u2019s \u201cMusic Man\u201d of the early 20th century"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photograph of James B. Beam provided by the Easton Kiwanis Club<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Article submitted by: James D. Moyer<\/p>\n

I have known about James Beam for some time, mostly from my family speaking of him.\u00a0 I have always been involved in music, especially public school music programs while growing up in Easton. Oftentimes my grandmother, great aunts and even parents would mention \u201cMr. Beam\u201d and that he would come around to their elementary classes with a tuning fork in hand and have them sing. He would sing \u201cGood morning\u201d or \u2018What\u2019s your name\u201d and the student would answer back in a repeated \u201csol-mi\u201d or descending minor third pattern. If you were involved in music at Easton High School, you were going to hear of Mr. James Beam.\u00a0 My great aunt Iona Huff once said he would tap his thumb to index finger and say \u201cbeat, beat, ready, sing\u201d.\u00a0 She graduated from Easton HS in 1925 from what is now known as the \u201cGovernor Wolf\u201d building. The class of 1925 was the last to graduate from this building before the high school moved to the 12th street building. Also, on a sad note for me as a lifelong music educator, Beam once told my father as an elementary student at Franklin School \u201cyou are a listener, not a singer\u201d. <\/em>To this day I have never heard my father sing, but will not dwell on this aspect in this article.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As I was in my office at Pennsbury High School one day watching choral music YouTube videos, I came across the Easton High School Choir under the direction of Mr. Pete Deshler singing the Easton High School Alma Mater <\/em>– the music composed by James Beam.\u00a0 Having attended Easton High School I knew Beam had composed this – and I knew that the text was written by former Easton High School Principal Mr. Elton E. Stone. We learned the Alma Mater<\/em> in choir at Easton HS under our then director Mr. Edward W. Milisits II, and sang it at graduation. We played it in the band under director Mr. Gerald Bender at every football game while the cheerleaders led the singing by the crowd and student body. All of the student cheering section knows the line \u201cEaston High School our High School so dear\u201d <\/em>if nothing else. Football games at Easton are filled with alumni on Friday nights – many of whom know the entire Alma Mater, but there\u2019s just as many that only know the one line. We also learned the text\/lyrics in Mr. Richard Grucela\u2019s homeroom class. Grucela felt it was important that all EAHS students knew the school song – but I don\u2019t remember ever being told about the men who created it.\u00a0 However, watching this YouTube performance of all three stanzas, hearing the Alma Mater<\/em> in its lilting triple meter, dancing like a waltz, intrigued me to find out more about this music man of my hometown. I knew there was more to Mr. Beam than just a school song.<\/p>\n

James Blain Beam was born in Easton on 27 April 1886 to George Henry Beam (1846-1909) and Lucy Ann (Hope) Beam (1852-1936).\u00a0 James was the 8th of their 12 children, and the family lived in Odenweldertown as late as 1897. The children were all born between the years 1874 and 1896.<\/p>\n

On New Year\u2019s Day 1909 just around 12 noon, George Henry Beam was fishing on the Lehigh River – here is an excerpt from his obituary in the Easton Argus of January 1, 1909:<\/p>\n

\u201cGeorge Henry Beam, a well known resident of this city, was accidentally drowned in the Lehigh river opposite Dock and Franklin Street, at noon today while he was trying to take up a fish net. He was sixty-one years of age and resided at 1214 Elm Street.<\/p>\n

Mr. Beam went across the river to within about ten feet of the south bank. While working with an oar it broke throwing him heading into the river. He was able to swim it is thought, but the cold water numbing him to such an extent that he was unable to help himself. His cries were heard by several boys who notified his sons-inlaw, Charles Bethman, Mathew Morrow and John Sigafoos, who reside nearby. Bethman jumped into a boat and Morrow and Sigafoos followed in another boat. They reached the place where Beam had gone under and recovered the body within ten minutes after it had disappeared. The body was taken to the residence of Manford Lantz, Dock and Franklin Street, where Dr. W.C. Roberts endeavored to resuscitate the unfortunate man.<\/p>\n

From the back window of the house members of the family saw the husband and father drown. The children would not let the mother look, but calmed her as best they could, assuring her it was someone else in peril. They saw him stand in the water for a time and then sink as if he had been in bed with the cold or taken with a cramp.\u201d<\/p>\n

While there is no information that his parents were musical, several of his siblings were quite musical and known as excellent local singers.\u00a0 Rebekah Beam was a well known educator and contralto in the Easton area, Lucy Beam Bethman was also a singer, and mother to C. Darl Bethman who was conductor of the Easton Oratorio Society, the Concordia Mannerchor as well as choral director at several local churches.\u00a0 Ima Beam Conkey was also a well known contralto and involved in musical activities during her life in both Easton and Long Island, NY. Chester Beam lived on the South Side of Easton and was an active singer at St. Paul\u2019s Lutheran Church on Berwick Street, and sang in many community musicals.<\/p>\n

James Blain Beam\u2019s music education began at the former Dock Street Chapel in Easton, this is where he took piano lessons around age 12 for .25\/per lesson.\u00a0 At the age of 14 he took over duties as the Sunday School pianist when the regular player moved away. Following his success in playing for the Sunday School his parents purchased him a Estey parlor organ (also called a harmonium) and his musical talent blossomed.\u00a0 He attended the Easton public schools and graduated from Easton High School. After high school he attended the Easton School of Business, also known locally as the \u2018Jones Business School\u2019 after its founder\/Principal Mr. R. L. Jones. This school operated from 1873 to about 1916, and held classes on the second floor of the Jones Building at 22-24 Centre Square (the former Bixler\u2019s building).<\/p>\n

Beam went on to receive a Bachelor of Science in Fine Arts degree in Music from New York University. He attended NYU part time in the summer and evenings while working full time during the day to pay for the tuition costs. Beam would spend his summers in NYC studying while teaching violin lessons at NYU. He completed a Master\u2019s Degree in Music (organ and voice) at New York Teachers College, and did additional graduate work in music at Cornell University.<\/p>\n

Beam served many churches in the Easton area as both organist and choir director.\u00a0 While working at St. John\u2019s Reformed Church in Riegelsville he met Dr. J. Fred Wolle (1863-1933) following a worship service.\u00a0 Wolle is the founder of the famous Bethlehem Bach Choir.\u00a0 This meeting would lead to Beam both studying organ with Wolle, and singing under his direction. Beam was called on by several Easton churches to help build their music programs and choirs.\u00a0 He took special pleasure in discovering good voices in people who had no idea they could sing.<\/p>\n

He was a charter member of the boards of the Easton Symphony Orchestra (founded by Earle D. Laros, EHS 1905), the Easton Oratorio Society, and the Easton Community Concerts Association.\u00a0 All of these organizations no longer exist today. In 1975 he was the first person in the Easton area to become a member of the Modern Music Masters (Tri-M) Society, a national honorary society for music. A member of the Easton Kiwanis Club since 1919 – he was honored with \u201cJim Beam Day\u201d on May 29, 1974 by the Kiwanis and a celebration dinner was held at the Hotel Easton.\u00a0 Guest speakers included County Judge Carleton T. Woodring, Mrs. Ethel Powell, and former EHS Principal Albert S. Erb. They all spoke about Beam\u2019s contributions to the community in music, education, art and service.\u00a0 Of course there was music performed, in addition to several solo pieces a quartet (including his sister Rebekah as the alto) sang his own setting of \u201cThe Lord\u2019s Prayer\u201d.<\/p>\n

Beam was hired by the Easton School district around 1915 and served as a music educator for 40+ years retiring in 1956.\u00a0 He is listed in the 1918 Rechauffe\u2019 (the Easton HS yearbook) as faculty, and began his duties as \u2018supervisor\u2019 in the fall of 1919.\u00a0 Also listed in the 1918 yearbook is M. Claude Rosenberry who was music supervisor from 1915-18.\u00a0 Rosenberry left the Easton School District in 1918 to go to the Reading Schools, and then in 1926 he was appointed as the first Director of Music Education for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of Public Instruction in Harrisburg.<\/p>\n

During Beam\u2019s time with the Easton Schools he taught music to students from Elementary through High School traveling to all the buildings in the District, including the school in Riegelsville. He directed the high school Boys and Girls Glee Clubs (and combined them to create a mixed choir as needed), the high school orchestra 1926-29, the band in 1927-28 (and was the first to allow girls to join the band) and oversaw the annual \u201cOperetta\u201d, which would now be similar to a high school musical theater performance. Beam, a noted composer and arranger of especially sacred music, composed two operettas: Hunter\u2019s Moon<\/em> and George Washington and his Rag-A\u2019-Muffins<\/em> that were performed at Easton High School.\u00a0 Hunter\u2019s Moon<\/em> was performed four times at EHS (1928, 1933, 1942 and 1954) and went on to be published by Chappell-Harms, Inc. He also served as Music Supervisor\/Music Superintendent working in both a teaching and administrative position. For many years he would spend his mornings preparing lessons for elementary students, and the afternoons at the high school with the ensembles and teaching music theory\/harmony and voice lessons.<\/p>\n

Beam had other compositions including a setting of \u201cThe Lord\u2019s Prayer\u201d for choir, a work called \u201cSupplication\u201d that was published by Boosey & Co. in 1920 as a solo, then published again in 1925 for solo tenor and mixed choir.\u00a0 Beam was moved to compose this work after learning of the combat death of a friend during World War I.<\/p>\n

Beam is probably most remembered in Easton High School history for composing the music to the school\u2019s Alma Mater in 1930-31. \u00a0The text was penned by then Principal, Mr. Elton E. Stone, and has three verses in a strophic form.\u00a0 The first verse – familiar to Easton High School graduates is:<\/p>\n

The Arch, with its Keystone, our symbol of strength,<\/em><\/p>\n

The Hills, where the green forests grow.<\/em><\/p>\n

And the Delaware Forks brings a message of old<\/em><\/p>\n

Where the great rivers, murmuring flow.<\/em><\/p>\n

All Hail! Alma Mater! The Pride of our Hearts!<\/em><\/p>\n

Easton High School, Our High School so dear.<\/em><\/p>\n

We pledge to your welfare the strength of our lives!<\/em><\/p>\n

Now and ever, as year passes year.<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

The \u201cArch\u201d refers to the arch that is in front of the former Easton High School, now known to most people as the Governor Wolf building on Second Street in downtown Easton.\u00a0 The EHS class of 1957 had a smaller version of the arch made in celebration of their 50th reunion, and installed at the current high school on 25th Street in 2007. Beam is said to have written the melody to the Alma Mater<\/em> in 10 minutes after school one day.<\/p>\n

Beam was well liked by his students, and very active as a faculty member at EHS.\u00a0 Some former students (now in their 80\u2019s) remember him as a \u201cjolly\u201d man with an \u201cinfectious laugh\u201d and a huge booming baritone voice.\u00a0 One former student stated \u201cyou could hear him coming to our classroom as he greeted people in the hallway with his huge voice\u201d.\u00a0 Another said \u201che was always happy and shared that joy for life with those around him\u201d.\u00a0 Beam\u2019s house at 1800 Lehigh Street in Wilson Boro was host to many a cast party following the operetta at Easton High School, with crowds of people stretching half a block around the house. It was the \u2018place to be\u2019.<\/p>\n

An avid reader and antique collector, it was not uncommon for Beam to just \u2018show up\u2019 at your house with something that he felt you needed.\u00a0 This could be a sofa, a cabinet or table, or even a piano.\u00a0 One family member recalls \u201cUncle Jim\u201d showing up with a pink spinet piano because he felt \u2018they needed a piano\u2019.\u00a0 It then had to be refinished and painted because, well, it was pink!\u00a0 But Beam was not going to pass up making sure they received what was needed.\u00a0 Also a lifelong supporter of the arts, he and his younger sister Rebekah, who was a locally known educator and contralto, for many years would not pass up their center section, front row balcony seats at the NYC Metropolitan Opera House.\u00a0 They were season ticket holders for 60 years and attended performances at both the \u201cold\u201d and \u201cnew\u201d Metropolitan Opera Houses. The Beam\u2019s experienced every major singer and conductor of the early and mid-20th century.<\/p>\n

It has been noted that Beam retired having used only one half of a sick day for illness during his 40+ years with the Easton School District, and since he led an evening concert on the same day that he was out sick for the morning only, the district removed the blemish from his record.<\/p>\n

He touched many lives during his years in public education.\u00a0 It is estimated that more than 50 students from Easton High School went on to study music professionally. Two notables include James McKeever (EHS class of 1936) who went on to be a professional singer and Professor of Voice at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, NJ, and Charles W. Rasely (EHS class of 1939) who studied at the Juilliard School in NYC and later became the Music Supervisor for the Oneida School District in New York. In 1976 Rasely composed a piece on a text by Emily Dickinson entitled \u201cI Never Saw A Moor\u201d<\/em> for mixed chorus and dedicated it to James B. Beam. Rasely\u2019s compositions are published by Plymouth Music Company, Inc.<\/p>\n

After his retirement in 1956 from the Easton School District, Beam taught music part time.\u00a0 He served various schools in Bethlehem Township including the Farmersville Elementary School. In 1963 he retired \u201cfor good\u201d at the age of 77.\u00a0 Beam then took up painting after being introduced to it by his nephew William Conkey who studied at the Philadelphia College of the Arts. He was interested in the mixing of paints and various techniques used.\u00a0 Beam himself said about music and art \u201cboth are means of self expression and both require an understanding of composition, balance, tone and texture.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n

Beam charged into this new passion head first and was completely self taught, joining five different county art associations and entering into all the art shows that came along.\u00a0 He was the winner of many shows in the Lehigh Valley and New Jersey, and had his own one man show at Little York Mill Gallery in New Jersey.\u00a0 He preferred to work in tempera and cover the finished work with layers of varnish and\/or shellac to bring out the colors. Rodale Press used one of his paintings of a \u2018winter scene\u2019 as the cover for the December 1972 issue of Prevention magazine.\u00a0 He has works in the Allentown Museum of Art as well as the Siegel Museum in Easton.\u00a0 Beam would often give away his paintings to friends, former students and family. There are many of his works still out in the community at large, and several have sold at auction.\u00a0 It is estimated that he painted 1500+ works, many of them the same \u2018scenes\u2019 but each an original work, and many scenes as remembered from his childhood. He described his style as \u201ca primitive and realist\u201d. His works are in a Grandma Moses<\/em> style of painting with Beam\u2019s own signature touch. He once stated \u201ca primitive painter won\u2019t pay much attention to perspective, but I try to\u201d.\u00a0 He had a great love and passion for painting, much like music earlier in his life, and continued to create art for the remainder of his life.<\/p>\n

James Blain Beam passed away in Easton Hospital on 11 July 1979 at the age of 93. He is buried in the Easton Heights Cemetery with the rest of his family. A simple stone marks his final resting place with the phrase \u201cMusic is akin to God\u201d etched into the stone.\u00a0 I am sorry that our paths on this earth crossed for only 15 years, and that I never had the opportunity to meet this local musician and artist – but I feel as though his spirit lives in his work, his memory, and now the students of his students.\u00a0 We as musicians stand on the shoulders of those before us, and I am grateful for what James Blain Beam brought to the Easton community, which is much more than just<\/em> the Easton High School Alma Mater.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a92023 James D. Moyer<\/p>\n

James D. Moyer, a native of Easton, is Director of Choral Activities at Pennsbury High School and Vocal Music Curriculum Coordinator k-12 for the Pennsbury School District in lower Bucks County, PA. He also serves as Director of Music for the Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville, NJ.\u00a0 A 1982 graduate of Easton Area High School, he holds degrees from Westminster Choir College, Princeton, New Jersey and the University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photograph of James B. Beam provided by the Easton Kiwanis Club Article submitted by: James D. Moyer I have known about James Beam for some time, mostly from my family … Continue reading James Blain Beam | Easton\u2019s \u201cMusic Man\u201d of the early 20th century<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":116597,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[5718,69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-116596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-easton","category-in-the-valley"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/James-B-Beam-Easton.jpg?fit=672%2C372&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=116596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/116597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=116596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=116596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=116596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}