Mount Wolf’s Frances G. Wolf a 20th-century mover in the York County community
In Mount Wolf, Pa.
For many years, Frances Cecilia Greenawalt Wolf was active in community events in Mount Wolf and throughout the York area. Also of interest: York author’s works adapted to the big screen: ‘Legacies,’ Part Last and York County Civil War hero grandmom of Gore Vidal and Re-printed York Hospital Auxiliary cookbook filled with ‘tried and tested’ York County, Pa., recipes.
Community-minded Mount Wolf residents are putting together a full slate of 100th-anniversary activitiesin that northeastern York County borough this spring and summer.
Those activities include collecting achievements of its citizens in that 100-year period.
So naturally, the Wolf family’s contributions would be explored… .
The contributions of Frances Cecilia Greenawalt Wolf caught organizers’ eyes, particularly her work on the York Hospital Fete in its early years. The Fete is best known today for the Book Nook, a massive book sale, set this year for June 25-27.
So to add more to the record, we put forth here the profile from “Legacies,” the 1984 AAUW publication, that provides a glimpse of some of Frances G. Wolf’s contributions, including her York Hospital Fete activities:
If you happened to be walking down Market Street in 1902, it’s possible you would have noticed a little girl, carrying a music satchel on her way to a piano lesson. She would have been smiling and perhaps humming as she hurried along. Frances Greenawalt Wolf had already developed a love for music that would continue throughout her life. Frances Cecilia Greenawalt Wolf was born in York on Oct. 4, 1892, and her father, Samuel Jacob Greenawalt, began to teach her to play the piano when she was 4 years old.
After Wolf graduated from York High School in 1910, she began music lessons with Dr. Urban H. Hershey. She studied harmony, theory, piano and organ with him for two years. She was also the organist at the Baptist Church on South George Street and taught piano to approximately 15 students. She joined the Oratorio Society and was an accompanist for the Shubert Society. She was also a charter member of the YWCA Chorus.
The Matinee Music Club was organized in 1913, and Wolf was one of its charter members. The members studied composers and music, and performed for each other.
In September, 1917, Frances Greenawalt married Charles B. Wolf, and the couple settled in Mount Wolf. Frances was the organist at the Mount Wolf United Brethren Church (now the Otterbein United Methodist Church) for 22 years. In the early 1930s, she became a charter member of the Community Concert Association, which brought many outstanding artists to the York area.
After her husband died in 1950, Wolf became a member of the York Hospital Auxiliary Board. Charles B. Wolf had been the president of York Hospital before his death. She worked on the first Hospital Fete in 1959.
Frances Greenawalt Wolf generously shared her talents with her family, church and community throughout her life. She enriched the lives of those who knew her and improved the quality of life in York County.
