CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
When I moved into the Angel’s Roost this September, I wasn’t told I’d have a built-in alarm clock.
It comes as a resounding sound across King’s campus, happening three (and sometimes four) times a day. Thanks to the bell, I’m well aware that it’s 8 a.m., 12 p.m. and 5 p.m.
Approximately.
While the bell is a rude awakening for any night owls, or afternoon nappers like myself, it also seems to go off at random times. Its unreliability creates time-based confusion and contributes to my noise-induced headaches.
Isabel Duque, a fellow resident of Angel’s Roost and a friend of mine created an impressive data set that tracked the times the bell rang over the past month.
Between Sept. 23 and Oct. 13, Duque recorded 26 counts of the bell going off, in which it rang:
- On-schedule six times.
- Off-schedule, within a window of under five minutes, 11 times.
- Off-schedule, within a window of five to 15 minutes, seven times.
The bell also rang an extra time on four of the 15 recorded days.
Essentially — the bell rings are a bit all over the place. And it is absolutely maddening.
Sofia Moon, another Angel’s Roost resident, disagrees. Instead, she “really likes” the bell.
“My childhood home in Toronto had a doorbell that sounded like church bells, so when it rings, it reminds me of being back in Toronto,” said Moon.
“[The bell is] loud but it’s good — that makes me happy,” she added.
So why does the bell ring when it does? It’s to designate the times of prayer for services at the chapel next door.
Rev. Ranall Ingalls, the chaplain at the King’s chapel, explained to me that “the bell marks hours, and especially hours of prayer.”
Because the chapel schedule may change depending on who’s leading the service and how punctual said leader is, the bell can run off schedule. The officiant and servers leading the prayer control the bell by pressing a button. After being activated, it rings five times. If they want the bell to ring 12 times at noon, it can be held longer.
The King’s bell has a long history, and has been around for quite a while. The book, King’s College: A Chronicle, references a “new and pleasant-toned bell from England,” which was sent as a replacement after a fire destroyed King’s original campus in Windsor, N.S. in 1920. According to the excerpt, the newer bell is quieter than the old one. I, for one, am thankful for that.
According to Ingalls, bells have a “long and glorious history.”
“They mark important occasions, whether deaths or births, or happy occasions or sad occasions,” said Ingalls. “For example, every year on December sixth, at the time of the Halifax explosion, the bell is rung for a minute, beginning exactly at the time the explosion took place.”
Ingalls told me that not everyone presses the button to designate prayer times — it seems the bell incites students’ antics for trouble.
Ingalls recalled one such occurrence from the late 70s when a first-year King’s student drunkenly snuck into the chapel with some friends and jammed the bell so it rang all night. The next morning, that student woke up to multiple college officials standing at the end of his bed.
“Probably shouldn’t have told you that,” said Ingalls. “It may give people ideas.”
Despite its knack for inconsistency, the ever-present bell-ringing connects past and present King’s students.
After learning its history, Moon was inclined to agree.
“Knowing the bell has been heard by generations of students before me — that’s pretty cool.” she said.
I, too, must admit that, now that I know more about my head-ache-causing and nap-interrupting neighbour, I can appreciate it for waking me up.
The bell is undeniably a quintessential part of the King’s experience, across time and space. However, I would suggest that incoming Angel’s Roosters be informed about their built-in alarm clock before moving in next September — or at least be provided with complimentary earplugs.
