Author: Steve Thomason

Cllr Martin Petchey (Lab, Stantonbury) held the position of MK’s first citizen until last week and marked the end of his year in office by handing over a cheque for £7,455.90 to the Bus Shelter MK.

At the start of his term in office Cllr Petchey set himself the task of completing about 45 minutes of continuous ringing – called a quarter peal – at all 21 available set of church bells in the borough.

And he completed the task without dropping a clanger on his very last day in office, at Old Wolverton. He is pictured at his home tower, Woughton-on-the-Green, where he began the clang-athon.

Cllr Petchey said: “One of the highlights was to ring a new method celebrating the anniversary of the consecration of Christ the Cornerstone Church in Central Milton Keynes – this was at Lavendon, as Cornerstone does not have bells.”

Cllr Petchey, who bell rings in the little spare time he has after carrying out his councillor duties, added that only non-ringers call it campanology.

He said that anyone who wanted to donate to the cause could still do so by making a donation to The Bus Shelter MK via its website.

(Reproduced from MK Citizen with permission)

I’m really pleased to be able to confirm the final value raised by the recent Ringing Day, organised by North Bucks.
This was a tremendous result and the Bell Fund Trustees are grateful to all the Church Authorities who allowed their bells to be used and we say a huge “thanks-you”  to everyone who played their part in making the day a success.
The weather was excellent and the visitors did not seem deterred by the MK Marathon which was on at the same time. 24 towers were opened and £1151.20 was collected from visiting ringers for investment.

Thanks to you all and very best wishes

Alan Marchbank
Chairman
Oxford Diocesan Bell Fund”

On March 13^th, 1992, in the presence of the Queen, a panoply of church leaders dedicated the Church of Christ the Cornerstone in Central Milton Keynes, the first ecumenical city centre church in Britain.  At the same time, at St Mary’s, Shenley, a band of ringers started to ring a quarter-peal in a new variation they named Cornerstone Doubles [Plain Bob with a Wallflower Single and a Grandsire Extreme] in honour of the new church. Unfortunately, a rope broke, and the quarter was unsuccessful – however, the band wrote to the Ringing World, and claimed the naming rights for the variation, which was therefore included in the on-line list of Doubles variations: http://www.cambridgeringing.info/Methods/Doubles/METHVAR.htm

This year, looking for another variation entirely, I came across it, and Doug Hird, the Branch archivist, was able to fill me in on the details.  I decided that it would be wonderful if, 27 years later, the branch could achieve the first quarter in the variation, especially as I needed some variety in my attempts to ring, as mayor, a quarter in every tower in Milton Keynes Council’s area.

A band made up of ringers from Woughton-on-the-Green, Bradwell and Bletchley, ringing at Lavendon, were ably steered by Simon Head through the pitfalls of unfamiliar calls (I think we knew the base method well enough), and achieved the first quarter in the variation, appropriately enough on the 27^th anniversary of the first attempt, and of the dedication of Cornerstone.  The details are here: https://bb.ringingworld.co.uk/view.php?id=1275951

Doug is not sure of the make-up of that first band, who named the variation – they might want to stand up and take a bow.

Martin Petchey