Douglas C. and Mary Alice Kranz Endowment.
Providing profound influence on the
worship experience.
The sanctuary’s pipe organ is one of the most spine tingling sounds that can happen during a worship service or special holiday performance. The sound resonates throughout the sanctuary that it can even be heard across the parking lot. It is a quintessential sound that reminds us all of worship as far back as our earliest childhood memories. Doug and Mary Alice loved the sound of a pipe organ so much that they even had one installed in their family home. In fact, it was Doug who joined the 1988 search committee to select and install our current organ. It isn’t a surprise that upon their death, the love of the organ continues through their very generous gift to repair and maintain our beautiful pipe organ for generations to enjoy.
Meet Doug and Mary Alice Kranz
Mary Alice and Doug met at Purdue University and were married for sixty-two years until her death in April of 2019. Her faithful husband died one month and ten days after her death.
After moving to Marietta in the mid-seventies, they joined RUMC and were active in all aspects of the church, especially the Music Ministry. They were members of the Sanctuary Choir for nearly forty years, and they also sang with the Michael O’Neal Singers.
Mary Alice was an accomplished seamstress and designed and sewed many costumes for choir concerts. She also designed and graphed all of the squares for the counted cross-stitch wall hanging, commemorating the Bicentennial of United States Methodism. It is on display in the RUMC parlor. She also had a special gift for writing notes to her friends and fellow choir members; no matter the occasion – sad or celebratory – her words were always perfect.
Doug was an accomplished musician. He played percussion and trumpet in the Purdue University Band, along with Astronaut Neil Armstrong. He also had a keen knowledge of church pipe organs. For many years, he and Mary Alice’s father, a church organist, traveled the country, “rescuing” church organs that were being demolished. He and Mary Alice had a four-rank organ in their home, which they found in Normandy UMC in suburban St. Louis. He also served on the committee to choose the builder of the 94-rank Möller pipe organ purchased for the new RUMC Sanctuary in 1989. He and organist, Tom Alderman, were great friends, and Doug served for many years as Tom’s tuning “assistant” for this organ.
They lived their lives committed to each other, their friends, their church and their Lord. Their legacy will live on at RUMC for many years to come.