Ringing World 5182 (20 August 2010)

Front cover: The French connection by Jim Phillips

EFTA (Every Fourth Tuesday Association) is one of those mid-week groups based in Kent meeting on a monthly basis for some morning ringing followed by a leisurely social lunch. Once a year the group travels on a day trip to France to visit a carillon or two and meet up with our own friendly carilloneur to demonstrate the instruments.

This year we set out on our most ambitious trip yet, to inspect and be treated to a recital on the Grand 70 bell carillon at Chambery and also to be taken on a conducted tour of the world famous Paccard bell foundry and to see a bell casting.

What’s up that tower? Chris Pickford explores ... Portsmouth Guildhall

The suggestion that Portsmouth Guildhall should feature in this series came from Geoff Dodd who had stepped outside to listen to the clock chime while visiting the nearby Wetherspoon’s pub. Soon afterwards I got a classic GKD letter telling me all about it – “de da la doe, de da …”, “boom, beautiful sound” he wrote, “boom, even more impressed”, “I’d put it at 4 tons” – and asking me “what’s up that tower?”

I knew that the bells were a big clock chime but not much more. An old Mears & Stainbank catalogue told me they were a Whitechapel chime, the 78cwt hour bell featuring, of course, in David Cawley’s ‘great bells’ list. Then I remembered there had been discussions on the Bell-Historians list about the proposed sale of the bells in 2008 and subsequent restoration completed by Taylors Eayre & Smith early in 2009.

Channel Islands Tour – 21st - 25th July by Morley Bray

Dominated by island hopping and involving chartered fights, ferries and waits for publication of relevant timetables, organisation of a trip covering all of the Channel Island towers was always going to be more challenging than the average ringing tour. The whole group was therefore particularly grateful to David and Mary Kelly for the efficient way in which they followed through some initial advice from former ringing colleague David Strong with all the necessary carefully planned arrangements.

Each of the three main days of the tour was dedicated to a different island, covering St Anne on Alderney, then St John’s and St Helier on Jersey and finally Forest, St Pierre du Bois, Vale and St Peter Port on the base island of Guernsey. There was also opportunity for sight seeing on all three islands.

Letters
Hanley — John Gipson
Staunton Harold — Brian Austin
Surprise for all — John Sunderland
Grow up — John Norris
Ring not ping — Rosemary Charles
In defence of “scary” ringers — James Sanderson
Puzzle answers — Chris Pickford; John Eisel
Kent Lovers — Satisfied of Beckenham

It’s not just the young — David’s story by Celia Barker

St Nicholas, Dereham has what is generally considered some of the finest bells in Norfolk, but two years ago the number of ringers who were committed to ring for Sunday services was frequently too few to man all eight ropes. Something had to be done and with the heavy ring, we discovered we could not attract and keep youngsters for long enough to supplement our team. Bill Dingle, our Deputy Tower Captain put an advertisement in the local paper and to everyone’s surprise there was a very positive response. Eight men and women of more mature years arrived on our practice night and local experts were coerced into helping to train them.

David, a local Cub Leader was amongst this group but was not always available due to scouting commitments. However he wished to learn to ring as part of his ‘Gold Discovery Award’. The final stage in a programme created for the over fifties, beginning with a Bronze level, Silver and finally Gold; not dissimilar to the Duke of Edinburgh Awards for the young. David’s intention was to complete his self imposed task to learn to ring for his award and that would be the end as far as he was concerned. A record of progress had to be written which, when completed and submitted, David brought to the Tower to show us. The following account is exactly as David recorded his progress.

Obituaries
John Townsend 1926 - 2010 — Ruth Margaret Cooper April 18th 1953 – December 29th 2009

Charmborough Ring at the Mid Devon Show by Tony Trigg

The North-East branch of the Guild of Devonshire Ringers covers 16 towers largely in the Tiverton and Cullompton Deaneries. The Mid-Devon Show is a very local, immensely popular mini-county show held right in the centre of our patch. What better place could there be to advertise ourselves and recruit more ringers. In previous years, we have had display boards with a small bell at the back of a shared tent, but this had not proved very effective. So this year we decided to have a stand of our own with purpose designed display boards and to bring in a mini-ring of six bells.

Fortunately we were able to hire the Charmborough Ring from the Charmborough Bell Trust (www.charmborough.org) and on the Friday evening before the show Roger Booth duly arrived with the ring on its trailer. With Roger’s expert guidance and a willing group of helpers it took less than two hours to have the ring up and working. We were very lucky with the weather; an enormous black cloud passed us by, while the sun shone. The Charmborough Ring is the heaviest portable ring available in the country, the bells ranging in weight from 39lb (18kg) for the treble to 94lb (43kg) for the tenor. They are rung without stays and have a very pleasing tone.

Thought for the Week
Being Loud
Many years ago I attended a rededication service at which we sang a few hymns etc. One of those hymns was ‘Angel Voices’. I thoroughly enjoyed singing it – more so than some of the ringing afterwards! I think we also sang Psalm 150 and (probably) a ringers’ hymn. All these are about making a noise. This seems to be the case with most ringers’ services. Yet we also seem obsessed with sound control and complaints.