After 43 trouble-free years safety zealots stop church clock
A PENSIONER who has climbed a wooden ladder to wind up a church clock for 43 years has been banned over health and safety fears.
Every week without fail, Tom Monk has negotiated the same stepladder to reach the clock’s handle, which he meticulously turns 400 times.
But despite carrying out the task on more than 2,200 occasions and winding the clock a whopping 894,400 times since 1969, Mr Monk has been told his time is up.
Instead, St Nicolas’s Church in Witham, Essex, has launched a £4,500 fundraising drive for a mechanism to enable someone standing on the ground to wind the clock.
Last night Mr Monk, 82, said: “I have never had any problems and would have been quite happy to carry on. Everything seems to be about health and safety, though, these days so I guess it was inevitable that this might happen.”
But until the cash has been raised the decision to stop Mr Monk’s weekly ritual means the church clock has stopped.
I have never had any problems and would have been quite happy to carry on. Everything seems to be about health and safety, though, these days so I guess it was inevitable that this might happen
Winding it used to take retired draftsman Mr Monk 15 minutes every Wednesday.
He said: “I climb the 28 steps to the church’s ringing chamber and then get the stepladder out to climb to the top of it.
“There is a knack to the winding, but when you have done it for 43 years its pretty straightforward.
“One Christmas morning several years ago we went to church and I wound the clock, yet somehow the stepladder had started to come loose.
“I brought it home with me on Christmas morning to repair it so I was not very popular that day.”
Mr Monk, whose wife Jean died in 1992, has not ruled out taking on the task of winding the clock after the new mechanism arrives.
The father of four says he plans to continue serving as a bellringer at the church.
Roy Belsham, of the church’s parochial council, which took the decision, said health and safety concerns were paramount.
He said: “Of course, when the clock first went up people did not think about health and safety. Climbing a ladder was just the normal thing to do back then.
“It’s a sensible decision really – Tom has not done anything wrong, it’s just about dealing with a danger which can be avoided.”
