When a complaint was made against the ringing of the bells at St John the Baptist, Hugglescote it became a hot topic following the news item reported by BBC Radio Leicester. On interviewing several locals, it became apparent most parishioners were all for hearing the church bells, including one lady who admitted she didn’t like the bells but accepted they were very much a part of the British Culture.

As such Radio Leicester ran a feature throughout the week based around bellringing. Andrew Wilby, CEO of Taylor’s Bell Foundry was interviewed on Tuesday about the origins of bell ringing and bell founding. I had the pleasure on Wednesday morning talking about why and how people got involved with ringing and our Guild. Andrew Preston and Tessa did a live studio interview on Thursday with an excellent plug for the youngsters and the Foundry Foxes and the week ended with Kiera and Geordan Boylan in the studio talking about being the fifth generation of their family being ringers.

As out Publicity Officer I feel I must congratulate and thank everyone for what turned out to be an excellent piece of publicity for us.

On the strength of this, I organised a band of Ringers at Sapcote, the following Tuesday, to ring live on air for the launch of the BBC make a Difference Awards for 2025. Peter Brown was interviewed just before we rang. Excellent publicity all round.

Mick Angrave.

Editor’s Note: I was able to capture a couple of the broadcasts, which you can listen to below.