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choco_froshLemme know if this is worth reading?
Lost Rings of North America: Christ Church Cathedral, Fredericton, NB
Hi, my name’s Josh Burson, and I…have a problem.
I’m obsessed with bell towers.
It’s not just wanting to ring at every tower in North America. It’s that I’ve memorized where all of them are, and in most cases can tell you how many bells they have, approximately when they were installed, and roughly how much they weigh. (This despite not having rung at any of them outside Massachusetts yet!) And I…I go past a church tower…any tower, sometimes…and I think “You could totally put a light six in there!”
(Yes, I’m a dork.)
This obsession has inevitably progressed from researching places have change ringing, to places that could have change ringing, and from there, to looking into places that used to have change ringing. If there’s anyone out there who share’s my addiction (from which all readers of this, I’m sure, will be immune), “There was Life Before NAG” (online at the NAGCR website) is an invaluable resource. But in addition, I believe I’ve now stumbled across evidence of another, hitherto forgotten Lost Ring of North America: Fredericton, New Brunswick.
Before I write this, I feel that I need to make two confessions. The first is that I’m a total belltower geek. (Done.) The second is that I’m not from New Brunswick; I am in no way affiliated with Christ Church Cathedral, Fredericton; I don’t think I’ve even been to Fredericton. My sole authority for all this is internet research and geekitude. But that said…
Christ Church Cathedral, Fredericton was essentially the brainchild of John Medley, the first bishop of New Brunswick. Medley was an early (and fairly hardcore) high churchman, not least in building one of the first Anglican cathedrals in North America in the fairly small capitol of a fairly small and newly-established diocese. Naturally, it had bells, although it wasn’t initially clear to me whether they were hung for changes. The tower is directly over the crossing, so either the ropes would have had a sixty-foot draft (somewhat as at Burlington, NJ, but even longer) or they would have had to somehow wedge the ringing chamber in the apparently non-existent space between the ceiling and the bells (as at Southminster in Pittsburgh.) But Medley, like the bells themselves, was an import from England, and evidently determined that the plans for the bells, like those of the church, would be both traditional and English. The clincher of the evidence for this comes from a volume of Papers Read at the Royal Institute of British Architects from 1855. (Thank you, Google Books!) In the aftermath of a paper on a new design for church bell hanging, the conversation turned to bell frames for changeringing. And to back up his argument on the subject, one of the interlocutors, E.B. Dennison, remarked that “he himself had designed the frame for the large peal of bells cast by Messrs. Warner for the Cathedral at Fredericton in 1852”. Evidently, then, they were indeed hung for changes.
In a perfect world, we could look at the record of their casting to provide proof positive, or venture up the tower and verify this by simple observation. Unfortunately, neither option is possible. The records of Warner & Sons are lost; and so, unfortunately, are the original bells of Fredericton.
In 1911, lightning struck the cathedral, starting a fire which quickly spread to the belfry. The bells, allegedly partly melted by the blaze, fell to the floor below when the steeple collapsed. At least some of the bells were melted down after the fire and recast as hundreds of dinner bells, which were sold as mementos to help raise money for the rebuilding. They were eventually replaced with a fifteen-bell chime donated by the Montreal financier Sir James Dunn.
So from 1852 until 1911, there was a large (25 cwt.!) ring of eight in Fredericton. Since then, there has been no change ringing in the Maritimes.
http://www.keltektrust.org.uk/downloads/lost_rings.xls
https://books.google.com/books?id=bJdZAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA62
Papers Read at the Royal Institute of British Architects, 1855
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_Church_Cathedral_(Fredericton)
Lost Rings of North America: Christ Church Cathedral, Fredericton, NB
Hi, my name’s Josh Burson, and I…have a problem.
I’m obsessed with bell towers.
It’s not just wanting to ring at every tower in North America. It’s that I’ve memorized where all of them are, and in most cases can tell you how many bells they have, approximately when they were installed, and roughly how much they weigh. (This despite not having rung at any of them outside Massachusetts yet!) And I…I go past a church tower…any tower, sometimes…and I think “You could totally put a light six in there!”
(Yes, I’m a dork.)
This obsession has inevitably progressed from researching places have change ringing, to places that could have change ringing, and from there, to looking into places that used to have change ringing. If there’s anyone out there who share’s my addiction (from which all readers of this, I’m sure, will be immune), “There was Life Before NAG” (online at the NAGCR website) is an invaluable resource. But in addition, I believe I’ve now stumbled across evidence of another, hitherto forgotten Lost Ring of North America: Fredericton, New Brunswick.
Before I write this, I feel that I need to make two confessions. The first is that I’m a total belltower geek. (Done.) The second is that I’m not from New Brunswick; I am in no way affiliated with Christ Church Cathedral, Fredericton; I don’t think I’ve even been to Fredericton. My sole authority for all this is internet research and geekitude. But that said…
Christ Church Cathedral, Fredericton was essentially the brainchild of John Medley, the first bishop of New Brunswick. Medley was an early (and fairly hardcore) high churchman, not least in building one of the first Anglican cathedrals in North America in the fairly small capitol of a fairly small and newly-established diocese. Naturally, it had bells, although it wasn’t initially clear to me whether they were hung for changes. The tower is directly over the crossing, so either the ropes would have had a sixty-foot draft (somewhat as at Burlington, NJ, but even longer) or they would have had to somehow wedge the ringing chamber in the apparently non-existent space between the ceiling and the bells (as at Southminster in Pittsburgh.) But Medley, like the bells themselves, was an import from England, and evidently determined that the plans for the bells, like those of the church, would be both traditional and English. The clincher of the evidence for this comes from a volume of Papers Read at the Royal Institute of British Architects from 1855. (Thank you, Google Books!) In the aftermath of a paper on a new design for church bell hanging, the conversation turned to bell frames for changeringing. And to back up his argument on the subject, one of the interlocutors, E.B. Dennison, remarked that “he himself had designed the frame for the large peal of bells cast by Messrs. Warner for the Cathedral at Fredericton in 1852”. Evidently, then, they were indeed hung for changes.
In a perfect world, we could look at the record of their casting to provide proof positive, or venture up the tower and verify this by simple observation. Unfortunately, neither option is possible. The records of Warner & Sons are lost; and so, unfortunately, are the original bells of Fredericton.
In 1911, lightning struck the cathedral, starting a fire which quickly spread to the belfry. The bells, allegedly partly melted by the blaze, fell to the floor below when the steeple collapsed. At least some of the bells were melted down after the fire and recast as hundreds of dinner bells, which were sold as mementos to help raise money for the rebuilding. They were eventually replaced with a fifteen-bell chime donated by the Montreal financier Sir James Dunn.
So from 1852 until 1911, there was a large (25 cwt.!) ring of eight in Fredericton. Since then, there has been no change ringing in the Maritimes.
http://www.keltektrust.org.uk/downloads/lost_rings.xls
https://books.google.com/books?id=bJdZAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA62
Papers Read at the Royal Institute of British Architects, 1855
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_Church_Cathedral_(Fredericton)
