WE NOW HAVE SUFFICIENT FUNDS IN PLACE. I'M SEARCHING JUST GIVING TO CLOSE THE PAGE. THE EARLIEST DATE THEY WILL GIVE ME IS 22nd Jan. Thanks to all who donated. We have several cheques en route from guis town council & freemasons & others.

THANK YOU FOR LOOKING

Many Guisborough people will have noticed that the Church Tower Clock no longer chimes. The Auto winding mechanism for the ¼ chimes is broken. This was removed by the Clockmakers Smith of Derby & is currently in storage with them pending funding for a repair. The ¼ chimes have been silenced 24 hrs a day, for approximately 3 years.

On the 1st Covid lockdown GMT/BST change resulted in the hourly chimes ringing 1 hour out, & these chimes were also silenced. Since the hour chimes were discontinued, many people local to the church remarked that their overnight sleep patterns & wellbeing are much improved. There is opposition from some living locally to the church to the re-commencement of overnight hourly chimes. (The ¼ chimes already have an overnight silencing mechanism)

Many other people are missing the comforting sound of chiming clock bells, they are saddened that this traditional town music has now ceased.

A Brief history of the clock. After Queen Victoria's death, the Guisborough Urban District Council (GUDC) passed a motion to erect a public town clock in her memory. Several locations were considered for the erection of a clock tower, but the position of the Market Cross rather stole the prime site for the erection of such a tower. In the end it was decided to replace the old church clock with a new clock, paid for by public subscription and maintained by the GUDC. The contract was undertaken by Messrs Potts & Son of Leeds, who made a specialty of public clocks, & it cost £150. This clock was installed & started on Jan 22nd 1902. The old clock was made by the Wilson family, who were clockmakers in the Market Place, they maintained and wound the old church clock, which predated the 1902 clock. This old clock is now at Hutton Le Hole Folk Museum. The 1902 clock has been maintained & serviced by Smiths of Derby (subsequent owners of Potts) & the local authority pays the annual service costs.

When the quarter chime malfunctioned, church wardens approached Redcar & Cleveland to fund the repair, they declined. Ownership of the clock is disputed. R & C, fairly claim that local authority budgets are strained, it is not listed in their archives as an R & C asset, & the clock is in the church therefore it is a church responsibility.

The Parochial Church Council (PCC) is stretched for funding, the upkeep of a grade 2 listed building, plus the Parish Hall in Bow Street is substantial. Keeping these two buildings watertight, heated, serviced, & secure, is considerable & is supported by a stretched congregation. It is an increasingly difficult burden for them. The clock is not listed as part of the church inventory. Clock timing chimes simply do not feature highly in their priority list.

Enquiries were made to Smiths the clockmaker for a quote to repair the ¼ chimes auto winder, £874 + Vat & a new night silencing system for both hourly & ¼ chimes £2275+Vat a grand total of £3,666.00. Following the impasse with both the Local Authority & the Church declining to fund major repairs. Three individuals were sourced & they have contributed the monies to place an order for the repair & modification. This was 4 weeks ago. Since then, Smiths started the repair work to the auto winder & found it to need parts that are now obsolete! They revised their quotation & have now quoted an additional charge for a new generation auto winder minus the sum defrayed for the original winder repair minus their profit on the new winder £1715 +Vat we now have a shortfall of £2058.00 !!!!!! any contribution will be most appreciated.