Ringing Forums

@Stella Bianco - I don't speak on behalf of KCACR, but from the 2022 rule book:

(iii) Honorary Life Members
In recognition of services to ringing a person may be nominated by the
General Committee for election as an Honorary Life Member. The
election of an Honorary Life Member must be approved by at least two
thirds of the Members present and voting at an Annual General
Meeting. Honorary Life Members shall be recognised as Practising
Members.
(iv) Non-Resident Life Members
A ringer not residing in the Association’s area may be elected as a Non–
Resident Life Member on payment of a single subscription equal to 75%
of the Practising Member Annual subscription.
(a) Non–Resident Life Members may be elected at a District meeting
or as authorised in Rule 11.
(b) A Practising Member whose subscription is not in arrears shall on
leaving the Association’s area have the option to become a Non-
Resident Life member without further payment. On return to the
Association’s area Practising Membership may be resumed on
payment of the appropriate subscription. Alternatively, they may
continue to be a Practising Member on payment of the Practising
Member annual subscription.

There is no provision for automatic life membership, the only two classes are those above.

@Steph @Alison - Non-resident members are a way to try to keep contact with ex members who have moved away, possibly temporarily. Students are the first ones that come to mind. It also helps to keep in touch with those of older years who revisit their old haunts occasionally. I think your example of "just once to ring a peal for an association, never pay again but magically become a life member" is a little extreme however. Perhaps associations ought to rule that qualifying years in part or in full must be "resident"? Something along the lines of 50 years, 25 of which must be a resident member.

You are certainly right about the default being Christian in the past. I've actually seen a military form being filled in some decades ago when the conversation went:
Officer: Religion?
Recruit: None
Officer: I'll put down CofE then
Recruit: Well I was born a Methodist but I'm not any more
Officer: OK, Methodist then.

I must say I hadn't hear "Belfry Praise" before, let alone sung it. I out to point out that the link from the President's blog is a bit misleading. It shows up as HAM 496, however that is only for the 1950 HAM Revised Edition. It had disappeared completely, both words and tune, in the 1983 HAM New Standard Edition.

Agreed.

But a donated bell belongs to the parish. Consider the box of beer my brother-in-law donated to me in memory of Christmas. He won't get any of that back, ever! More seriously, unless there is some sort of restriction, a donation is a free gift regardless of inscriptions. One of the bells in Rochester Cathedral was donated by the USS Pittsburgh and part of the letter from the CO reads:

“I hand you herewith a check for £52, 10s, from Admiral Huse, the Officers and Men of Pittsburg, to cover the cost of re-casting a bell for the Cathedral chimes. I understand that it is agreeable to you to have the bell marked “U.S.S. Pittsburgh, 1920.”

“Please accept this as a token of our great appreciation of kindnesses received, and of our sincere desire that our two peoples may always happily associate and feel as kindly toward each other, as we do, to our hosts of the last two-and-a-half months. May the Pittsburgh bell sound from the Tower of your ancient city a sweet tone, a note of goodwill from us to you."

It was duly cast with “U.S.S. PITTSBURGH IN MEMORY OF 1920” as an inscription. Clearly a gift with no strings attached.

"fairy 'nuff".

Don't you have to ring a peal or something similar before you can join ART? I remember there was some comment in the RW maybe 10 years ago that ART was irrelevant to change ringing towers.

No John, I was responding to Roger's post and the page of links to recruitment ideas.

Interesting, I didn't realise that the ART site would be open to the public, I thought it was a bit of a "closed shop" for high end method ringers only. I'll have a study of the ideas.

If you have got some magical way to attract demand, then please share. We have a lovely ring of 8 (15-2-4 in F) but most Sundays we only have 3 or 4 ringers. I can't for the life of me see the argument that we should charge for what we have been given for free. I paid nothing to learn, I'm not going to charge recruits. Unlike archery the equipment is provided for free by the parish. Also unlike archery, ringing is both a pleasure and a service. Getting out of bed early on a cold, wet, January Sunday to ring call changes on 3 can be a chore, but it is the QPQ for the enjoyable times.

There's a bit of supply and demand here though. Many of the examples you give have a waiting list, or at least are in continuous demand. The same is not true of many towers. We would love some new recruits, why I might even take them down the pub and buy them a pint, certainly not charge them.

Some of the organs go to private houses. Obviously not the larger ones, but the smaller "chapel" organs are sometimes snapped up by private buyers and exported.

I lived in Middlesbrough in the '70s and saw exactly the changes you mention. The St. Hilda's district (Mum taught at the school) was gradually reduced to a wasteland with packs of dogs roaming the street, all the while the southern boundary of the town was expanding. Dad was a Methodist Minister there and had to supervise the closure of several chapels which were simply in the wrong place with no-one living near them. However I see that even Avenue Methodist, which used to be the centre of the circuit, closed 10 years ago and is now a "Community Project" with the church apparently only used for weddings.

That's really good to hear. I was trying to make a more general point though, not just about your particular church. @Tristan Lockheart started the thread expressing concern about services being moved to church halls and away from the churches themselves. What I was suggesting (if somewhat clumsily) was that if the church buildings were reordered in some cases a modern church hall could be made redundant and the older church used as a combined space. Obviously only applicable in some cases. The fact that you need both clearly puts you outside of the churches where the clergy and choir outnumber the congregation.

That's a promising situation. Making the church more suitable for community use means that it will be heated and kept dry. A good alternative to selling it off. Getting back to the original issue of services in church halls, perhaps if the churches themselves were more flexible the churches could be retained as a combined hall and church, and flog off the new buildings?

I'm afraid that this is a long-term trend. The last census showed that 46.2% of the population of England and Wales claimed to be some variety of Christian. The next largest group is "irreligion" at 37.2%. Faced with these figures and the continuing decline in attendance (often caused by ageing), the CofE needs to reconsider its organisation and buildings sooner than later. Other sects such as the Methodists, URC etc have slimmed down their estates but the CofE has two major problems not faced by the Free Churches. One is that so many parish churches are listed and the other is that most are surrounded by graveyards. This can make conversion to business premises or dwellings difficult, therefore expensive and as a result reduce the market values.

How will this affect the exercise? Well I'm afraid we will have to accept that there will be less towers in the future. I hope that bells can be reallocated by the likes of the Keltek Trust. We probably need to plan and allow for retrenchment, just as the Church should be. It may be controversial, but we probably ought to be pressing for non-Anglican and secular rings to preserve the bells and the traditions. Perhaps some wedding venues could be persuaded to have proper bells installed?

As regards "festival churches". Any building left unheated and untended apart from 8 days in the year will deteriorate. Not just the mould, but various rots and rusts. What will a parish with limited funds do when faced with buildings they are liable for which are decaying to the point of being dangerous?

I'm afraid it was a bit too much of the arty meditation for me. Some modern composer trying to make you feel as if you were "inside the bell" and playing tricks with the electronics. It would have been far better to use the time to explain a bit more about methods, or even [sotto voce] call changes.

The normal place for muffles in most towers most of the time is in a cupboard or drawer, so would simply delivering them to the ringing chamber not count as "fitting"? Could it be shown that a subcontractor (Royal Mail or DHL for example) had performed the "fitting" at the company's direction? Just a wild, off the wall, idea from someone who is NOT a lawyer, businessman or tax expert.

@John de Overa If you need over £1,000 of replacement stays, might the band's bell handling be a bit off?