All the TRC ringers helping with the parachuting including the Town Crier who opened the event.
Congratulations to Eddie on achieving level 5, the highest award on the Learning the Ropes scheme. Eddie started learning to ring at the After School Bell Club at Bampton in September 2017. With a short break due to Covid restrictions he returned to ringing in late 2022. At each level from mid-2023 he has completed ringing targets, including Quarter Peals to complete levels 3, 4 & 5. The final Quarter Peal for level 5 he rang inside to Plain Bob Minor. He is now a regular member of the Bampton band where he calls touches. He also helps with the new members of the After School Bell Club, both at Bampton and Tiverton. He was presented with his certificate and badge at the Teddy Parachuting at Bampton on August Bank Holiday.
All the TRC ringers helping with the
parachuting including the Town Crier who opened the event.
Sheila Scofield
August Bank Holiday Monday 2024 saw the annual event at Bampton where children & adults of Bampton bring their teddies and other soft toys to be launched from the top of the tower, tied to a parachute. The weather was almost perfect for the event, dry and a light breeze, with the occasional gust. We had to retrieve a few from the porch roof and the yew tree, but most made an elegant landing.
reassuring their owners that they would be ok
raised up to the roof, 2By2. Then holding onto the safety line, they helped to guide them down safely
directing them to the certificate writers, Mike H and Louise.
Sheila Scofield
Not content with calling his first quarter peal of Minor on the previous Wednesday evening, Fergus has followed this up this week with his first peal on the morning of Friday 23rd August:
Details of the peal are:
Guild of Devonshire Ringers
Huntsham, Devon
All Saints
Friday, 23 August 2024 in 2h 50m (8–0–27 in A♭)
5040 Plain Bob Minor
Composed by: R Bailey
1 Michael Hatchett
2 Richard C Shere
3 Sheila J Scofield
4 Fergus Kettleborough
5 Leslie E Boyce
6 John R Martin (C)
First peal - 4. 50th peal - 5. This peal included a first peal ringer on bell 4.
Fergus began his ringing career in January 2015 and is a graduate of the Bampton Primary After-School Bell Club. He rang his first quarter peal in November 2017 and has rung 18 further quarters since. He completed Learning the Ropes Level 5 in June last year.
Having just completed his A-levels, Fergus is taking a gap year before going to Liverpool University where he hopes to develop his ringing further. The peal on 23rd August was also the 50th for Les Boyce and the first on the bells by an all-North East Branch band since their restoration in 2005.
Les Boyce
The bells of St Michael’s, Bampton were rung by local ringers on 14th August in a special quarter peal in memory of former resident, Tony Toze, and to welcome his son, Jonathan, and family on the occasion of their visit to the town. Tony and his brother, Mike, were ringers at Bampton in the 1950s and early 60s before they emigrated to Australia in 1965. Such was Tony’s enthusiasm for bellringing that in Australia he was largely instrumental in getting the bells in Brisbane Cathedral rehung for English-style change ringing in the 1980s. His brother Mike, now in his 80s, is still an active ringer there. Relatives of the family are buried in Bampton churchyard.
After the quarter peal we met the Toze family for coffee in the church and Jonathan told us some more about his father and a bit of the history of the family in Bampton. The same evening the Bellamy family - John, Peter, Mary and Alice – got in touch to say that they had learnt to ring at Bampton and were close friends of the Toze family. They thanked us for ringing the quarter.
Details of the quarter peal are:
Troyte Ringing Centre
Bampton, Devon
St Michael and All Angels
Wednesday, 14 August 2024 in 45m (14–0–3 in F♯)
1260 Doubles (3m): 480 St Simon's, 480 St Martin's, 300 Plain Bob
1 Jenny Jones
2 Sheila Scofield
3 Fergus Kettleborough
4 Mike Ward
5 Leslie Boyce (C)
6 Chris Bolt
In memory of (Reginald) Tony Toze, who died in October 2020, former resident of Bampton. Rung on the occasion of the visit to Bampton of his family from Australia. Also for the 150th anniversary of the Guild of Devonshire Ringers.
Les Boyce
Our learners at Bampton & Tiverton St Peter’s had started ringing for services and doing well, but we found that we needed to give them more rope time as they became ‘improvers’. Both towers have very busy practices with lots of ringers at different levels which consequentially means that the ‘improvers’ weren’t getting sufficient time to develop their skills and fine tune their handling.
During May we set up three sessions of 2 hours each, using Tiverton, St Paul’s bells on the simulators. Using all the fun activities in the Learning the Ropes (ART) scheme in the level 2 targets, we gave 5 improvers some bespoke practices to develop their skills, ready to move on to Plain Hunt. Activities included:- Place making, dodging, whole pull and stand, facing out of the circle, ringing after a bell at the opposite stroke, pulling off in reverse rounds, switcheroo, ringing up & down between 2 bells, calling themselves down to lead in call changes, …. And lots more.
There was lots of laughter, discussion and REFRESHMENTS. Everyone made significant progress. We will definitely do this again.
Sheila Scofield
On Saturday 23 September Lesley Houghton and I ventured up to All Saints at Huntsham for an extended practice in raising and lowering in peal.
Les Boyce and Sheila Scofield, of the Troyte Ringing Centre, aided by five other excellent ringers, tutored, supported and guided us through, willingly sharing their wealth of ringing knowledge and expertise. Places on the session were limited to four, which resulted in plenty of rope time for us all, with attention being given to help us individually with our own particular difficulties. Initially we were ringing just three bells, but by the end of the morning we were all raising and lowering on the six more confidently than we had been three hours previously. The outing was much enjoyed by us both and I hope that I’ll remember at least some of the very valuable lessons in practice.
Annie Ashton