Chicago Sun-Times suntimes.com--By Staff reporter
The widow of gospel music legend Thomas A. Dorsey glowed as she listened to a musical tribute to her late husband Sunday across the street from his old church, Pilgrim Baptist, which is trying to rebuild after it was consumed by fire last year.
Dorsey is credited with creating gospel by blending spirituals and a bluesy beat. The legendary Mahalia Jackson sang his famous song, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord," at the funeral of the Rev. Martin Luther King. His hymns have comforted people for decades and were covered by artists including Elvis Presley, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans.
But to Kathryn Dorsey -- still a lovely belle of Greenville, Miss., at age 93 -- he was the husband she laughed with and loved.
People lined up to greet her at the church community center, 3300 S. Indiana. They knelt to hug her under her broad-brimmed white hat.
She likes old-timey gospel. Today's music has "gotten away from the Christian feeling," she said.
"He was proud of just about all of [his hymns], but 'Precious Lord' was the best, I thought," she said.
Dorsey wrote the hymn in the depths of despair after his first wife, Nettie, died in childbirth in 1932. Their infant son died soon after, and they were buried in the same casket.
Kathryn Dorsey was humming the hymn a few days before her husband died in 1993. Dorsey, longtime choir director at Pilgrim Baptist Church, "was trying to direct [me]."
It didn't go very well, she said. "I couldn't carry a note if they gave it to me," she laughed. "He always said 'if you can talk, you can sing.' And I always said, 'I haven't learned to talk yet.'"
Dorsey met his second wife at church. "He said he was looking over the crowd and when he saw me, he said, 'That's my wife,'" she said.
"I was standing waiting for my bus, and he said 'I'll take you home.'"
She knew who he was. "He was more famous then than he would be now." They married in 1941.
Dorsey wrote "Peace in the Valley" and hundreds of other hymns. "He would go to bed sometimes and get up and write a whole song, and then they would sing it in church."
"How many people have been blessed to witness that song? It's been sung in theaters, parks, funerals, schools, auditoriums," said WVON gospel host Pam Page Morris. "It's been translated into 52 languages."
"That's really what carries the church, and is carrying them now," said Tyrone Jordan, 51, a church trustee and Chicago police officer.
Donations to restore the church may be sent to Pilgrim Baptist Church Rebuilding Fund, Amalgamated Bank, P.O. Box 94433, Chicago, Ill., 60690-4433.
Dorsey is credited with creating gospel by blending spirituals and a bluesy beat. The legendary Mahalia Jackson sang his famous song, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord," at the funeral of the Rev. Martin Luther King. His hymns have comforted people for decades and were covered by artists including Elvis Presley, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans.
But to Kathryn Dorsey -- still a lovely belle of Greenville, Miss., at age 93 -- he was the husband she laughed with and loved.
People lined up to greet her at the church community center, 3300 S. Indiana. They knelt to hug her under her broad-brimmed white hat.
She likes old-timey gospel. Today's music has "gotten away from the Christian feeling," she said.
"He was proud of just about all of [his hymns], but 'Precious Lord' was the best, I thought," she said.
Dorsey wrote the hymn in the depths of despair after his first wife, Nettie, died in childbirth in 1932. Their infant son died soon after, and they were buried in the same casket.
Kathryn Dorsey was humming the hymn a few days before her husband died in 1993. Dorsey, longtime choir director at Pilgrim Baptist Church, "was trying to direct [me]."
It didn't go very well, she said. "I couldn't carry a note if they gave it to me," she laughed. "He always said 'if you can talk, you can sing.' And I always said, 'I haven't learned to talk yet.'"
Dorsey met his second wife at church. "He said he was looking over the crowd and when he saw me, he said, 'That's my wife,'" she said.
"I was standing waiting for my bus, and he said 'I'll take you home.'"
She knew who he was. "He was more famous then than he would be now." They married in 1941.
Dorsey wrote "Peace in the Valley" and hundreds of other hymns. "He would go to bed sometimes and get up and write a whole song, and then they would sing it in church."
"How many people have been blessed to witness that song? It's been sung in theaters, parks, funerals, schools, auditoriums," said WVON gospel host Pam Page Morris. "It's been translated into 52 languages."
"That's really what carries the church, and is carrying them now," said Tyrone Jordan, 51, a church trustee and Chicago police officer.
Donations to restore the church may be sent to Pilgrim Baptist Church Rebuilding Fund, Amalgamated Bank, P.O. Box 94433, Chicago, Ill., 60690-4433.
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