Bells ring once again at Cathedral of the Epiphany

By RENEE WEBB, Globe editor
April 19, 2007

When Father Paul-Louis Arts was pastor at St. Francis Parish in Sioux City he made a donation of three bells to the Cathedral of the Epiphany.

"Little did I know that I would come here one day," said Father Arts, who is now rector at the Cathedral.

He explained that the three bells had once been part of St. Francis School and they were removed when the school closed. Eventually that building had been torn down.

The priest hadn't been aware of the existence of the bells until the parish center had been sold to a local AA group after St. Francis Church had closed. At that time, someone informed him of the bells and he found them in storage at the parish center. Initially, he stored them in St. Francis Church because the building was not being used.

"I eventually decided to give them to Cathedral because I knew it didn't have bells and it was undergoing restoration at that time," explained Father Arts.

The three bells from St. Francis - which were made by Stuckstede and Brothers of St. Louis in 1910 - were in storage for several years at Cathedral until recently.

The largest of the bells from St. Francis weighs 450 pounds, the middle bell is 350 pounds and the smallest bell weighs 150 pounds.

Father Arts pointed out that those three bells join one bell that has been part of Cathedral's parish since its early years. Weighing in at 850 pounds, the original bell from the parish is the largest of the four.

"On that bell, it has the words, Mary Help of Christians, which was the name of the second building we had. That church was located at the corner of 9th and Pierce Streets where Security Bank is," noted the Cathedral rector. "According to parish history, the Bishop of Dubuque was here for confirmation and there was an earthquake during the confirmation in 1887. At that time, the tower was damaged and they decided the church was unsafe and too small so they sold the property."

At that time, the parish bought property at its present location of 10th and Douglas. Construction was underway on the new St. Mary Church when the parish was named a cathedral for the new Diocese of Sioux City in 1902.

Like the bells from St. Francis, that bell had sat idle for many years.

When the Cathedral was raising money for the new organ and as the parish staff reflected upon the restoration of the church, the two items that had not been completed were the organ and bells.

"I had mentioned it several times from the pulpit that we had these bells and we'd love someday to be able to hang them," said Father Arts. "One day a parish family offered to pay for the installation of the bells as a memorial to a deceased person in their family."

The memorial gift from that family paid for the installation, and then the Cathedral Altar Society paid for the hauling of the bells up to the tower. The bells were lifted up to the choir loft balcony at the same time the console of the organ was brought up. They needed special machinery to do the lifting and three pews were temporarily removed from the back of the church to make room for the equipment. Later, raising the bells to the tower took several men.

Rather than sway, these bells are stationary and they are hit with a striker to sound out the chimes. The bells were all placed in the north tower.

"All four bells are very good, bronze bells and they all have the same tonality - they sound good when you ring them together," said Father Arts.

The bells rang for the first time at the Chrism Mass.

Starting at 9 a.m., the bells count out the time of day on the hour. For instance, the bells bong three times at 3 p.m., four times at 4 p.m. and so on. On the one-hour hour it bongs once. The bells ring for the Angelus at 12 noon and 6 p.m.

"The bells chime five minutes before the noon weekday Masses and before all weekend Masses. Traditionally, bells are a call to worship so you want to let people know that Mass is about to start," he said.

While most of the chimes are scheduled to ring automatically, they have a remote control, which allows them to ring the bells at any time.

A blessing and dedication ceremony for both the bells and the new organ is planned for this spring.

"The bells are a wonderful gift to the parish and it, along with the organ, completes the restoration of the Cathedral," said Father Arts. "With the organ and the bells to compliment the beauty of the building, we now have the sound that goes along with it."