The Oxford Electric Bell or Clarendon Dry Pile is an experimental electric bell that was set up in 1840 and which has rung almost continuously ever since. It was "one of the first pieces" purchased for a collection of apparatus by clergyman and physicist Robert Walker. It is usually located in the foyer of the Clarendon Laboratory at the University of Oxford, England, but as of December 2009 it has been moved into an adjacent corridor due to construction work, and is still ringing, though inaudibly, because it is behind two layers of glass.
Read more about Oxford Electric Bell: Design
Famous quotes containing the words oxford, electric and/or bell:
“Christianity as an organized religion has not always had a harmonious relationship with the family. Unlike Judaism, it kept almost no rituals that took place in private homes. The esteem that monasticism and priestly celibacy enjoyed implied a denigration of marriage and parenthood.”
—Beatrice Gottlieb, U.S. historian. The Family in the Western World from the Black Death to the Industrial Age, ch. 12, Oxford University Press (1993)
“Suddenly Im not half the girl
I used to be.
Theres a shadow hanging over me . . .
From me to you out of my electric devil....”
—Anne Sexton (19281974)
“You owe me ten shillings,
Say the bells of St. Helens.
When will you pay me?
Say the bells of Old Bailey.
When I grow rich,
Say the bells of Shoreditch.
Pray when will that be?
Say the bells of Stepney.
I am sure I dont know,
Says the great bell of Bow.”
—Unknown. The Bells of London (l. 1322)