My journey!
In general I have spent my life bucking the trend on what girls and women are expected to do (sports, hobbies, career, temperament, family – well lack if it). For
Instigated by the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers
In general I have spent my life bucking the trend on what girls and women are expected to do (sports, hobbies, career, temperament, family – well lack if it). For
MENTORS: Although I was taught by a man, and my two main mentors were men, thinking back I think it was the women in leadership roles who encouraged me the
When I learnt to ring in the late 70s it was definitely a male-dominated activity, and there were people about that didn't approve of
women in the bell tower. I
When my husband and I started conducting in our young tower, we agreed that I would conduct Plain Bob and he, Grandsire. We did not know at that stage that
When I learned to ring as a teenager in Buckinghamshire, I was one of the better ringers at my home tower and was greatly encouraged to call touches and help
I agree with many of the comments made in previous stories so far. I have been ringing for more than 40 years now, with a couple of breaks, mainly with
I carried out an analysis of quarter peals in Suffolk for our annual report including the gender of ringers and conductors. The analysis is done on people's implied gender by their given
A few years ago, I called a peal. When it was published in the RW, I noticed I was the only female peal conductor that week. I had a millisecond's
I agree with the writer of the 'Conducting' piece. Although I conducted a number of quarters and pieces during practices, I find that as
our band is now mainly older
Two women/girls in our tower were encouraged to ring the Tenor (15 1/2 cwt) and made a habit of it (though neither progressed to turning it in - yet). In
When I started ringing as a short 14yr old (admittedly a long time ago!) the tower possessed one box, height about 6 inches, for a reasonably heavy ring of 8
Why is it that there is an even gender balance among ringers in the early stages of ringing, but the gender distribution changes at more “advanced levels”?
I got
I had always wanted to learn to conduct, and having married one of the best composers and conductors there is I thought it would be easy.
Sadly his idea of
After I had learned a few methods I started going to other local practices and learned to call simple touches at a local tower where I
was the most experienced
Perhaps I have been extremely fortunate, but I have experienced very little opposition from anyone as I have progressed in ringing. I was
taught when I was still at school
Having learnt as a teenager I had lots of opportunities for calling touches, quarters and peals. I met and married a ringer and then all the opportunities seemed to stop
I was lucky as a young ringer to have encouragement to learn to call touches, go on a conducting course, call some quarters and even a peal. I had good
I was encouraged to call touches at my tower. I felt at that time when the feminist movement was on the rise that I had try and ring back bells/call
At our annual association festival one year I realised that the quarter-peal bands, arranged by the organisers, typically had only 1 or 2
women, and that year there were no
Running practices in the 1990s I realised that when a visiting male/female couple came into the tower I would ask the man first about his willingness and ability to conduct
I was taught to ring by a woman in a fairly well balanced tower. The male tower captain encouraged others to conduct, I was able to ring every bell in
I learnt to ring in an odd-struck, rather lumpy 6, but I thought they were great. I learned with other teens and we had a good group, going to meetings
I was ringing at a cathedral after a 12-bell. The person running the ringing and asked, in a cheeky way, if I would be ok Ringing the tenor. I defo
I was taught to ring in my thirties at a local village church. After a few years, I started calling changes, touches and QPs, mostly out of necessity. Together with
Last year (2019), I was on holiday with my two girls and we went to a local practice night. Along with another (male) visitor who
happened to also turn up