For Whom The Bell Tolls...

I have been blessed with the opportunity to work at the Historical County Courthouse in Brigham City. I'll admit for the past two-and-a-half years that I've worked here, I've kind of taken this building for granted. I can't tell you when it was built or added on to or how big it is or really any of it's history. But it truely is an amazing building, and I'm lucky to have the priviledge of working here everyday.

This is how the building looked back in the 1890's. Since then it's gone through quite a few upgrades...

Here's how it looked in 1905.

I'm not sure when this picture was taken, but they eventually added on to the front of the building, and this is pretty similar to how it looked when I started working here two-and-a-half years ago - except at some point they took out the fence in front.

I recently had an opportunity to do something that not a lot of people get to do. I was able to go inside the bell tower! Sounds silly, I know, but there are truely some amazing things about this small part of the courthouse. So with no further ado, I give you ...

...THE BELL TOWERSomething I wouldn't have believed from looking at the outside of the belltower - there are FOUR levels inside this thing!

The first level mainly holds the County's phone equipment - who would have known that it takes all these circuits and wires to get phone calls in and out of this place???

The second floor holds the bell. Surprisingly, the chimes that ring through Brigham City every hour is actually a recording! The bell has been retired - I wonder if all the dust and bird crap affects the sound at all...

Here's a pic of Forest Street looking out from the window on the 2nd floor of the bell tower. What an amazing view! Now I know where to go when I need to "get away from it all" at work!

The third floor is home to 4 clocks - one facing each direction - which are all synchronized by metal bars running all the way across the length and width of the room so they all show the exact same time. Above the clock, you can see the speaker that the bell recording sounds from - and yes, it's VERY loud inside the bell tower when it goes off!

My favorite thing about the bell tower is that if you look very closely, you can see that people have written their signatures with the date on the walls in various places throughout the tower. This one is dated 1911! Maybe someday my name will be there somewhere.