Bush Legends: Brookhampton Bell Ringers still on song 100 years on

A pioneering South West farming family is desperately hoping the death knell isn’t about to be sounded on their century-old pastime. Beautiful bells have been ringing in the tiny hamlet of Brookhampton, just a 7km drive south-east of Donnybrook, since 1904 in an artistic pursuit that has since almost continuously bonded the small town’s tight community. But cousins Peter and Neville Clifford, who grew up more as brothers and are currently the longest-serving tintinnabulators within the Brookhampton Bellringers, are concerned about a generational dying out for the group which included their grandfather Alf as one of the founding members. “The average age would be getting up pretty high now and we haven’t got much youth,” said Peter, 72, who has been president of the group for the past 25 years. “It’s hard to get people interested, but we’ve had a couple of new ringers come recently and we just hope it can continue on.” The best-known history tells that the Brookhampton Bellringers were born when a man by the name of Frank Young, who had been living in Coolgardie, bought the hand bells from the Goldfields town’s disbanding St Andrew’s Bell Ringers, and took them with him to his new South West home in 1903. On joining the local Thomson’s Brook Musical Club, Young taught some fellow members how to play the bells and they quickly became established as a popular entity at the Brookhampton Hall, which was built in 1899 and remains the home of the Bellringers. The structure was also of great use during World War II as a place where refugees from Singapore and Malaysia were billeted after being recruited to dig up potatoes amid an acute labour shortage. Young later sold his bells to the people of Brookhampton and many from that original set are still used by the current players. Even Young’s granddaughter, well-known local Helen Tuia, at one point continued the tradition he started. “Three or four children was the norm for a lot of the families at the time and at least one of them usually loved a bit of music, so a lot of them at least had a go at the bells,” Peter, whose father was a long-time conductor, said. “A lot of people couldn’t play them, but they still came and had a try. There has always just been a lot of pride that we’re the Brookhampton Bellringers.” The first Clifford to move to the area was the cousins’ great-grandfather Tom, who had been a water-carter in the Goldfields after arriving in WA from Victoria. Tom met a nasty demise when he was killed while blowing up stumps, just a month after his son Bert had been killed in action in World War I. Tom’s son Alf was an instrumental community figure, a fine sportsman and log-chopper who was also pretty handy with an accordion. He was one of Young’s first bell-ringing pupils. “He used to give us P.K. chewing gum, I remember that,” Peter said. “He was more of a forester than a farmer.” The “Alf Clifford Memorial Park”, land which he had donated to the community for sport, is still marked across the road from the hall. Neville, 74, recalled starting his cricket career there with “one pad, one glove and maybe a box”. The stump that Alf’s brother “Uncle Johnny” _ a master of the one-liner _ used to sit on to watch the cricket remains on the hill. “People used to ask him about the weather,” Neville said. “He’d give them answers like, ‘Take your coat’ and wouldn’t say anything else.” From the early 1900s, there was also an annual New Year’s sports day on the ground which featured competitions including foot racing, jumps, tilting the ring, treacle bun races, three-legged races, in-the-sack ladies races, old buffers races, sheaf tossing, throwing the ball and a lolly scramble. “Someone would bring out a tin, say gallon size, call out ‘chook chook’ and throw lollies all around as if feeding fowls,” an excerpt from The History of Thomson Brook explains. “And didn’t the kiddies enjoy this.” The hall, which served as a school room until 1903 and is still a community hub like it has always been, was also where Neville held his buck’s party and Peter celebrated his 21st birthday. Its floor has been ruined several times - by roller skating, by World War II prisoners and there are currently telling repair marks from motorcycle burnouts when a bikies’ gig became a little robust. During the war years, locals kept regular dances running in the hall in a bid to keep their “comforts fund” afloat. The cousins’ aunt Flo Clifford, described as the “honourable secretary”, wrote about the innovative efforts during the Bellringers’ centenary celebrations in 2004. “One of the efforts was an ‘Ugly Man Competition (not necessarily so literally),” she wrote. “It was quite a big thing with surrounding districts taking part. Our candidate was a very handsome boy named Len Cain (later killed in action). We were all delighted when we beat the other guys from Donnybrook. “We raised five hundred pounds. Pretty good for little Brookhampton. The old hall has a very warm spot in my heart.” Neville quipped that there were, “still plenty of ugly men around”. The Clifford cousins made a natural progression into the Bellringers in the early 1960s, following their fathers Bernie and Lionel, Alf’s sons, into the group. Peter could see the hall, where he and his fellow Bell Ringers still practice every Thursday night, up the road from his childhood farm home. “I can remember coming down and playing the bells in the old supper room,” he said. “I left the town for a considerable time, but I started playing again in about 1991 and have been playing ever since.” In 1991, after a brief hiatus for the Bellringers, Neville placed an advertisement in the local newspaper calling for expressions of interest in playing and green shoots sprouted again. It allowed Neville to continue a passion he had pursued since the age of 15, when he would drive his father’s old Mach II Zephyr to the hall to play. “It was licensed, of course,” he laughed. “I even remember old Eric Gibbons out the back cranking up the old petrol motor to get the power going. I can also remember looking up as a kid and watching my dad and my uncle playing and I was mesmerised. “I was just so taken by it. It’s a lovely, mellow sound, not a clangy sound, and it’s such good fun.” In 1996, Neville even visited England’s old Whitechapel Hall Foundry where the bells were made. “We were very lucky to get in,” he said. “I think the fact that I was a bell ringer allowed us to get into the place for a look. They must have believed I was, at least.” But Peter admitted that when the bells were sent back to Whitechapel for a refurbishing a handful of years ago, they were told to never polish them with Brasso. “For 100 years, they’ve been polished with Brasso and they still looked pretty good,” he said. Several of the bells were once stolen and later found in Darwin. The big “G” bell was also cracked on two sides when it was used as a dinner signal for internees during World War II with the cover taken off the clapper to make it louder. The Brookhampton Bellringers, with the rare playing style of picking up their bells from a table and hoisting them skyward with a flick of the wrist to get one rung note, played at the opening of Perth’s Bell Tower, at an international bell symposium in Brisbane and have even recorded an album. Neville and Peter both cited Spanish Chant as one of their favourite songs to play. “It’s tricky to play, but it’s a lovely tune,” Neville said.

Bush Legends: Brookhampton Bell Ringers still on song 100 years on

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