Swaledale Festival Artistic Director Malcolm Creese has fairly recently taken up bell-ringing (note not ‘campanology’) in church towers near his home in Cambridgeshire and so has taken a great interest in the campaigns by St Mary's Church, Richmond and St Andrew's Church, Grinton to refurbish their bells.
We recently had this good news about the Grinton project.
Grinton
Those attending the 2015 Swaledale Festival events in St Andrew's Church Grinton will remember that the Festival helped to launch an appeal for an extra two bells to add to the existing six in the tower. The appeal has gone much better than expected and it is now nearing its target. The original plan was to use two of the bells from St Mary's in Richmond, but their appeal is for a much larger sum (to replace all eight bells) and they still have some way to go. With their agreement, St Andrew's has now decided to go it alone and two new bells have now been ordered from the bell foundry, Taylor's of Loughborough. We are hoping that the bells will be installed in the tower in Spring 2016. Grinton Church is very grateful for the support of the Festival in the project. There is still the chance to make donations which will contribute to some essential maintenance of the existing bells; these should be sent to John Wilkinson, Churchwarden, Topside House, Marrick, Richmond, DL11 7LQ or left in the special bell appeal envelopes in the church.
Richmond
St Mary's Church, Richmond is in the process of raising £140,000 in order to remove its existing bells and frame and install a newly cast ring of eight bells into a new single storey, cast iron frame. The old bells, 5 of which are historic, one dating from before the Dissolution of the Monasteries when it hung in Easby Abbey, will be installed in a frame for chiming and on view to all.
During the Festival there will be an Open Day in the tower which will be an opportunity to find out about bells and ringing and why the bells in English churches are different from those of other traditions.
If you are already curious there is nothing to stop you from contacting the ringers to find out more about ‘the exercise’ as some ringers refer to it. See www.richmondbells.com