A little more

Moving something of this magnitude is a LOT OF WORK!
So far, the ones who have helped in some way have been my brother, John Cook; Josh and Ross Smith (Stan Smith's sons); Walker, Sawyer and Braxton Allen ( children of Kristy and Leon Atkins); and Semmes White.
I remember well the first time I saw it. The organ was inside a storage "pod": an aluminum trailer, of sorts, about 8 feet  wide, 7 feet tall and probably 35 feet long. The Shumway family had been using it for storage=of course-, and the organ took up the back half of the pod.
Peering around some items that they had not moved yet, I could see it! The pipes were orderly arranged,  all the longer ones lying on their sides. The wooden ones were stacked on top of each other, and -supported by two by fours running across the width of the pod- were the longer metal pipes and the wooden shutters, wind ductwork, and framing pieces. Then there were some cardboard boxes in which there were smaller wooden pipes and the remaining smaller metal pipes, some of them damaged way beyond repair.
But where was the console?!  It was all the way to the back of the pod. In front of it was the mammoth blower, the xylophone, the impressively heavy harp and several dice boxes(?) (more on that later).
Even after removing some of the pipes I couldn't really see the console. I am NOT the sized person that can easily balance negotiating through obstacles and wooden pallets. So the Atkin boys were kind enough to help me "see" what was back there.They all helped, at different times because you KNOW that young brothers just can't seem to get along for more than 10 minutes at a time! Walker and Sawyer helped move a few bigger things, and Braxton was the one who really saw the console for the first time. I would ask him questions and he would tell me what he saw. It was quite the scene , as he really didn't know what he was looking at and I was not quite sure, myself!
Finally, I could get at the console.
I remember saying to myself "It's beautiful...beautiful," as I gazed upon the battered thing.
I KNEW that I could bring the console back to life, as far as refinishing. I KNEW it.
So, over the course of several weeks, I slowly got the parts moved.
It was NOT easy. I am ALWAYS at the mercy of helpers, and if none are available at the moment, then I try to find some way I can do without!
One such case came with the biggest of the wooden pipes.
Standing close to 8 feet long, made out of close to 1 inch spruce, and measuring -in cross section- some15 inches by 13 inches, each of those pipes weighed a LOT !!!!! But I was determined to get them, and so I would drag them out of the pod, where then I would bear-hug the pipe and then tilt it over my shoulder to carry the thing! WOW!!!!  It was rough!!
The two pieces that were the worse were the console and the blower.
Ross helped me with the console, and as we were moving/dragging it out from the rear, it would creak and crack. Ross would stop shoving and look at me.
"Don't worry", I would say." If it breaks or falls apart, then that is a good thing! I then can glue it back even stronger than before!"
Yeah, it WAS worse than I thought. The organ was 91 years old. Its joints had started to open up, and the case was wobbly. But, again, that worked to my advantage: I knew what HAD to be done to make it stable, again.
The blower. HOLY COW!!!  Was that thing a beast!! Semmes and I had originally made a trial run of it, and we both declared it too much for just the two of us. So with a little planning, Semmes, Josh Smith, John and I got together late one afternoon and headed for the pod. It was a struggle of epic proportions. But we got it!
After looking at it at my shop, and doing a little dismantling of it, most of the dead weight was in the MOTOR: an old Westinghouse 3 horsepower, 220 volt, 3 phase motor! The metal fan enclosures were really not that heavy. It was just that it was so awkward to handle, I guess.
I still have a few framing pieces to move, and will get them, soon. But, the heaviest stuff is over with.
My garage shop is slowly getting re-organized. It will take a while.
And even though I swore I wouldn't start on it yet, I have restored several pieces of it. Pictures to come, soon.