Bells.

When I was a kid, we attended Goshen United Methodist Church in Milton, DE. It was a big brick structure on a hill, and there was a bell high atop the building…I assume in the steeple.

My memory is foggy about the specifics, but I seem to remember you could access the bell through a seldom used door and some steps. There you’d find a huge rope that disappeared into the attic area, but was apparently hooked to the giant bell. I never saw the bell, but it had to be huge. Granted, I probably only weighed 60 lbs at the time but I remember it was hard to pull but once I did it could lift me off the ground.

The bell rang loud and clear, probably all over town. I think Henry Morgan was in charge of the bell, but he let us kids ring it now and then.

I wonder if it still works?

I was thinking about bells because I am reading a biography about Paul Revere. Before he became famous for delivering midnight messages via horseback, he was a bell ringer.

When he was a kid, he was paid two pennies a week to ring the set of 8 bells at Old North Church. He rang them for two hours a week.

He literally had a ringing in his ears.

Before telephones and radio and other forms of communication, bells apparently played an important part in conveying messages to communities.

They were used to mark time, call people to meals or to worship, signal the beginning or ending of a work day, and for alerts and warnings. A rapid, continuous ringing of the bells signified a fire alarm. Bells also warned about floods or attacks from approaching enemies.

We had a big black bell on a post at our farm when I was a kid. It didn’t get used much, but Mom did use it now and then to announce dinner was ready when Dad and I were in the chicken house or barn. She probably would have preferred texting.

Later, when I had a young family, we had that bell on our back deck and we’d use it to summon the boys who were off riding their bikes or playing in the campground behind our house. One time we rang the bell to tell them dinner was ready and about a dozen campers showed up at our door holding empty dinner plates. It was hilarious.

Mom used to call the phone company “Ma Bell”. I always assumed it was because the phone rang like a bell. But apparently it was because of Alexander Graham Bell, one of the inventors of the telephone.

Nobody uses the phone to talk anymore, and hardly anybody uses a ringing bell to signify an incoming call or message.

Landlines still ring, and I heard a story recently about somebody’s landline ringing after years of silence and the teens in the house got up and ran outside because they thought it was a fire alarm.

There used to be school bells. And Christmas bells. And I guess there still are wedding bells. Or is that just an expression? I’ve been to a lot of weddings but I don’t remember hearing bells.

Jingle bells. Door bells. Cow bells. Hells bells…whatever that means. Bicycle bells and ship bells.

I’ll be there with bells on. Does that ring a bell? He was saved by the bell. It was clear as a bell. For whom the bell tolls. And on New Year’s Eve we ring out the old and ring in the new.

Finally who can forget Pavlov and his dog. Whenever the dog heard a bell, he started to salivate.

I wonder if every time Pavlov heard a bell he felt the need to feed a dog.