Bell Ringing - News & Events
A ringing endorsement for Ffion’s artwork
Ffion’s winning design will soon be appearing
on the bell-ringers’ new polo tops
A painting of a bell and stained-glass window by an Overton schoolgirl will soon be turned into polo tops – to be worn by our team of bell-ringers!
Ffion Evans won a competition staged by St Mary’s Church-in-Wales School to find a design which the ringers could use as a logo to emblazon on polo shirts. These will be worn for key bell-ringing events like weddings or other special occasions.
Fellow pupil Grace Horrocks was runner-up and will join Ffion on a trip to the top of the bell tower as a prize for their excellent designs.
Tower Captain Clare Morris said that the ringers thought it would be a nice idea to involve children from the village school.
“We decided as a group of bell ringers to have a ringing polo top with a logo for use at weddings and trips/competitions etc,” Clare said. “Using an idea from the Ruthin ringers, I approached St Mary’s School to launch a competition for the children in years four and five to design our logo.”
Towards the end of the summer term, Clare and two other bell ringers, Pauline and Jim, and Rev Peter Mackriell gave the pupils and teacher Nia Williams a tour of the ringing room, rang a bell up and down and then gave them a tour of the church.
“Every child had a small treat and there was a special chocolate prize for the runner up and winner,” Clare added. “The main prize is for both children to go up into the bell tower and watch the bells in action with ear defenders on. They will then go up and out to the top of the tower and view Overton from on high.”
Clare hopes to take Ffion and Grace up the tower sometime over the summer holidays.
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A certificate to be proud of
Continued from the home page . . .
Overton bell-ringers were rewarded with an official certificate from the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers and Ringing World Bellboard to mark their successful Quarter Peal in celebration of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee:
Bell-ringers complete two successful “Quarter Peals”
The bells of St Mary’s rang out on the morning of Saturday, September 4th, for 45 minutes in memory of a couple who helped ring the bells in our church for many years.
Six ringers from four local churches got together to perform a rarely-heard Quarter Peal based on a complex method called Plain Bob Doubles, comprising 1,260 changes of sequence. Their achievement will now be recorded on a ‘BellBoard’ – a database of all quarter and full peals around the world.
Reg and June Jones, who both sadly died last year (2020), were longstanding bell-ringers. As age caught up with them, Reg preferred to ring Bell 3 as it allowed him to lean against the wall for support and June became the “bride look-out” at weddings, ready to alert the others of her arrival!
The Quarter Peal was witnessed by their sons, Richard and Gareth. Revd Peter Mackriell said prayers beforehand.
Overton’s brand new bell ropes
Bells one to six were rung by Samantha Bateman-Green, Annette Broughton, Clare Morris, Andy Burgess, Peter L Furniss and Steve Broughton.
This was followed by a further successful Quarter Peal on Saturday October 16th, especially arranged and rung as a compliment to Keith Overthrow, Tower Captain at St Mary’s church from 1978 to 2020.
The current Tower Captain, Clare Morris, said they were very grateful to the Friends of St Mary's church (FOSM) for kindly funding the purchase of new bell ropes.
Overton’s bell ringers hope to follow up next year with a Full Peal at the church – something we have not heard in the village since 1971. A full peal involves thousands of changes and takes more than three hours to complete.
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