[Bell Historians] Fwd: Meneely File

[LOVE, Dickon]

>Can anyone open the file?

It seems to be in 2 parts. I have given them both below in simple text form.
I am also copying this to Robert Lewis in case he finds any of this of
interest to run in the Ringing World - it is certainly worthy of reference,
if not full blown coverage.

Dickon


PRESS RELEASE IS AS BELOW:

Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
Burden Iron Works Museum
One East Industrial Parkway
Troy, NY 12180-5942
518-274-5267 voice and fax
www.hudsonmohawkgateway.org
carroll at r...

Meneely Bicentennial
Will Commemorate Area's Bell-Making Heritage
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway Joins with Multiple Partners
to Stage Mid-May Extravaganza

For Immediate Release
Thursday, 18 April 2002
Contact:	P. Thomas Carroll, Executive Director
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
518-274-5267 carroll at r...

Troy, New York - May 19, 2002, marks the 200th birthday of Andrew Meneely,
the patriarch of a network of historic bell-makers in New York's Capital
Region who have placed significant bells throughout the nation and
throughout the world, including the replacement for the cracked Liberty
Bell. To commemorate the work of Andrew Meneely and his circle, the Hudson
Mohawk Industrial Gateway has joined with a number of partners to sponsor a
series of mid-May events related to the area's bell-making heritage.
Anchoring the celebrations will be a new exhibit at the Gateway's
Burden Iron Works Museum, which will be unveiled on Friday, 17 May, at 5:00
p.m. The exhibit will contain rare artifacts of New York's bell-making
trade, including early Meneely surveying instruments, tuning forks used to
match new bells to old, and the wooden sweeps used to shape the mold for the
Independence Hall bell. This will be followed by a day-long bus tour the
following day, which will visit Meneely grave sites in the Albany Rural
Cemetery and Oakwood Cemetery, the sites of the four bell foundries, and
samples of the bells from all four foundries. Reservations are required for
the bus tour, which costs $59 and includes lunch at the Troy Pub. On Sunday,
19 May, the Burden Museum exhibit will be open to the public without charge
from 9:00 a.m. to noon, and from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. a public celebration will
be staged at the Troy Pub & Uncle Sam Brewery, the current home of the
2,000-pound Meneely bell that Senator Joseph L. Bruno rescued for the
Gateway's use in 1998. That bell will be rung ceremoniously at 3 p.m. in
memory of Andrew Meneely, and the Gateway is urging owners of Meneely bells
throughout the world to ring their bells at the same time.
Joining the Gateway in observation of the Meneely achievements will
be a number of additional partners, including nearby New York State Heritage
Area Visitor Centers and the Rensselaer County Historical Society. On
Thursday, 09 May, the Saratoga Springs Heritage Area Visitor Center will
offer a noon lecture by Gateway Executive Director P. Thomas Carroll on the
history of area bell-making, followed by the ringing of the four-bell Putnam
Memorial peal of Meneely bells at nearby Bethesda Episcopal Church. Two days
later, from 1:00 to 3:00 p.m., the Rensselaer County Historical Society will
sponsor a lecture by Gateway Trustee and collector William H. Skerritt on
the history of the Meneely and Gurley firms, followed by the ringing of
their rare Hanks bell. That event will also witness the publication of the
Gateway's new booklet, The Bell-Casters of Troy, by Gateway Trustee Sydney
Ross. Then on Sunday afternoon, 19 May, both the Albany Heritage Area
Visitors Center at Quackenbush Square and the Schenectady Heritage Area
Visitor Center will sponsor commemorative events. At 1:00 p.m., the
Schenectady Heritage Area will offer a lecture by chimer and noted bell
expert Joe Connors. The program will begin at St. Joseph's Church on
Lafayette Street and continue at St. Adalbert's Catholic Church off Crane
Street. Each segment will conclude with a ringing of each church's Troy
Meneely peal. In Albany at 1:30 p.m., there will be a free tour and musical
bell performance at St. Peter's Episcopal Church, 107 State Street,
featuring their chime of 11 Troy Meneely bells.
In honor of the event the Gateway will soon be posting to its web
site an extensive listing of known Troy Meneely bell installations
throughout the world, compiled by noted bell rigger Edward Kehn and his
ancestors and transcribed and edited by Jess Brodnax. This impressive list
includes thousands of bells, in every major country in the world, installed
between 1869 and 1952. Also available will be a listing of the known events
for the celebration and a brief history of Meneely bells. The Gateway's web
site is at www.hudsonmohawkgateway.org. Additional background on Andrew
Meneely and his bell-making heritage is also being provided in a follow-on
press release to this document. All nearby New York State Heritage Area
Visitor Centers will have information available to guide those looking for
area bells and for activities related to the bicentennial. For further
information, call the various participants: Hudson Mohawk Industrial
Gateway at 518-274-5267; Albany Visitors Center at 518-434-0405; Cohoes
RiverSpark Visitor Center at 518-237-7999; Rensselaer County Historical
Society at 518-272-7232; Saratoga Springs Heritage Area Visitor Center at
518-587-3241; and Schenectady Heritage Area Visitor Center at 518-382-7890
or 518-382-5147.
The Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway is a not-for-profit,
tax-exempt, charitable and educational corporation chartered by the Regents
of the State of New York. Headquartered in the Burden Iron Works Museum at
the heart of the Silicon Valley of the nineteenth century, it promotes
regional economic prosperity through the appreciation of the Capital
District's historic industries and the appropriate use of its historic
architecture. The Gateway also operates Troy's RiverSpark Visitor Center for
the City of Troy.

Troy, New York - May 19, 2002, marks the 200th birthday of Andrew Meneely,
the patriarch of a network of historic bell-makers in New York's Capital
Region who have placed significant bells throughout the nation and
throughout the world, including the replacement for the cracked Liberty
Bell. To commemorate the work of Andrew Meneely and his circle, the Hudson
Mohawk Industrial Gateway has joined with a number of partners to sponsor a
series of mid-May events related to the area's bell-making heritage. Those
activities were detailed in an earlier press release. This press release
provides supplementary background information concerning Andrew Meneely and
bell-making related to him.
Born in what is now Watervliet to Northern Irish immigrants Andrew
and Eleanor Cobb Meneely, Andrew Meneely quickly became the hub of four
important bell firms, the most important network of bell-makers in the
history of the New World. As a boy he apprenticed at the Hanks foundry,
established near his home by Colonel Benjamin Hanks of Mansfield,
Connecticut, as a facility at which his son Julius Hanks could produce tower
clocks, surveying instruments, and bells for the growing stream of
immigrants migrating west along the Mohawk to the lands opened up by the
Louisiana Purchase. When Julius relocated to Troy in 1825, setting up shop
at what would later evolve into surveying instrument giant W. & L.E. Gurley,
Meneely assumed ownership of the original site after having married into the
Hanks family. There he gradually evolved the company's focus more and more
toward bells exclusively. Andrew Meneely died at age 49 on 14 October 1851,
leaving the business to his two oldest sons Edwin and George. A year later,
with the financial backing of investor and inventor Eber Jones, their
brother-in-law James Harvey Hitchcock formed the competing firm of Jones &
Hitchcock in Troy. Then in 1869, following distinguished service in the
Civil War, their younger brother Clinton H. Meneely joined with his
brother-in-law George H. Kimberly to form what would become the competing
Meneely Bell Company of Troy. Before the last of them closed in 1951, these
four firms produced on the order of a hundred thousand bells and pioneered
many important improvements in the bell-making art. Many prominent
Meneely-related bells now ring around the world, including the 13,000-pound
Centennial Bell that today hangs in Philadelphia's Independence Hall in
place of the cracked Liberty Bell.
For further information, contact the Gateway at 518-274-5267, or
contact its various partners in these activities: Albany Visitors Center at
518-434-0405; Cohoes RiverSpark Visitor Center at 518-237-7999; Rensselaer
County Historical Society at 518-272-7232; Saratoga Springs Heritage Area
Visitor Center at 518-587-3241; and Schenectady Heritage Area Visitor Center
at 518-382-7890 or 518-382-5147.
The Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway is a not-for-profit,
tax-exempt, charitable and educational corporation chartered by the Regents
of the State of New York. Headquartered in the Burden Iron Works Museum at
the heart of the Silicon Valley of the nineteenth century, it promotes
regional economic prosperity through the appreciation of the Capital
District's historic industries and the appropriate use of its historic
architecture. The Gateway also operates Troy's RiverSpark Visitor Center for
the City of Troy.


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