Staplehurst Bell Ringers

NEWS FROM THE TOWER

Staplehurst Bellringers Report May 2024

On Easter Monday the Kent County Association of Change Ringers, to which Staplehurst is affiliated and of which our ringers are members, held their Annual General Meeting at Rainham.  At this meeting our Tower Secretary Roy Barclay was presented with a certificate in recognition of his 50 years’ membership of the Association.  Several more of our ringers will be marking that milestone in the next few years.

On Friday 26th April we welcomed the Scouts to the tower to learn a little about ringing, and see a demonstration of how it’s done.  They seemed to enjoy it and, who knows, we might even gain some recruits! We are always happy to arrange group visits to the tower for members of village organisations. All you need to do is contact me at staplehurst_bells@roybarclay.plus.com

On May 12th we will be celebrating the annual Bell Sunday – a day where the contribution of bells and bellringers to the life of the Church is recognised.  We hope that some of our ringers will be involved in the service, but details have yet to be decided.  The following Sunday, 19th May, we will be ringing the bells at various times between 1.30 and 3pm as part of the Friends of All Saints’ 30th birthday celebrations.  The Friends made a very generous donation towards the rehanging and augmentation of our bells as their first project, so we are keen to help them celebrate the occasion. Please note that this will mean that, exceptionally, the bells will be ringing both morning and afternoon on that day.

On Wednesday 22nd May we will be hosting the monthly Learning Hub between 7.30 and 9pm. Other than this and the Friends’ birthday celebrations we will be ringing for the usual Sunday Services and our normal Tuesday practice.

Roy Barclay

Tower Secretary

Visiting Us

All Saints Church Website (External link)

NEWS FROM THE TOWER

By the time you read this Easter will have come and gone and spring will (hopefully) be here.  Normally that would herald the start of the wedding season but this year there are no weddings booked where the couple have asked for the bells to be rung.  Nor have we currently had any requests from visiting bands wishing to ring our bells, but this might well change as we get further into the summer.

We are, however, continuing with our series of Learning Hubs as mentioned in last month’s Magazine. The next ones to be held at Staplehurst will be on Wednesdays 10th April (when the simulator will be used, meaning that no sound will be audible outside the tower) and 24th April when the bells will be rung open from 7.30 – 9pm.

Other than this we will be ringing for our usual Tuesday evening practice and the normal Sunday Services.

Roy Barclay

Tower Secretary

NEWS FROM THE TOWER

In years gone by if you wanted to learn to ring you would simply go along to your local church and one of the locals would teach you the basics and that was it. The trouble was that the person who taught you wasn’t always that good themselves and even less good at passing their knowledge on. I was fortunate that many years ago when I learnt to ring my tutor was good at both.

However things have moved on and training is a lot more sophisticated these days. Several years ago an Association of Ringing Teachers (ART) was set up with the objective of ensuring those teaching new ringers were competent to do so. Potential teachers are assessed and after reaching a required standard are accredited. Here at Staplehurst we are lucky to have Sue and Chris Bassett who are both accredited.

Kent is also at the forefront when it comes to training ringers, with an established series of ART Learning Hubs one of which, as mentioned last month, is taking place at Staplehurst on Wednesday 6th March. We will be using the simulator (another innovation in recent years) so there will be no noise audible outside the tower.

On Mothering Sunday 10th March we will as usual be ringing during the “clipping” of the church. This is a tradition, thought to be unique to Staplehurst, where the congregation encircle the church building as if to embrace mother church. If anyone would like to know more about the history of this event I am sure the Rector would be happy to enlighten you.

Roy Barclay

Tower Secretary

NEWS FROM THE TOWER

As mentioned last month four of our recruits are now ringing regularly for Sunday Service and another three are at various stages of training. After the loss of several ringers following the pandemic this is indeed good news and means that we are now able to ring all 10 of our bells much more often.

Here at Staplehurst it has long been our philosophy to recruit and train ringers for the future. Many of us who did return after Covid are of, shall we say, more mature years and sadly age eventually catches up with even the fittest of ringers. It is pleasing therefore that we now have a band of mixed ages, including two teenagers, ready to take ringing at Staplehurst forward in years to come.

Sue Bassett has been largely responsible for the training of our recruits and we are grateful for all the time and effort she continues to put in. Not only this, but she is also heavily involved in a Learning Hub for new ringers held regularly at various Towers in West Kent. In March the Hub comes to Staplehurst, but more about that in the next issue.

We are not expecting any visiting bands during February, so we will just be ringing on our normal Tuesday practice evening, for the regular Sunday services and hopefully for the Ash Wednesday service on 14^th February.  As ever, details of all ringing are available on our website at https://bells.allsaintsstaplehurst.co.uk/

Roy Barclay

Tower Secretary