Big Ben's Great Bell Rang for the First Time
On this day · 11 July 1859
London's most famous bell finally struck the hour in 1859, only to crack itself silent within weeks.
On 11 July 1859, the great hour bell inside the clock tower at the Palace of Westminster sounded across London for the first time. The bell most people now call Big Ben had been cast the year before at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry by George Mears, replacing an earlier bell that shattered during testing. Weighing around 13.5 tonnes, it had been winched slowly up the tower to hang above the newly running Great Clock, which had begun keeping time on 31 May 1859.
The triumph was brief. By September 1859 the new bell had also cracked, struck by a hammer far heavier than its makers advised, and it fell silent for roughly four years.
The fix was elegantly simple: turn the bell so the hammer hit a fresh spot.
On the advice of Sir George Airy, the Astronomer Royal, the bell was rotated a quarter turn, fitted with a lighter hammer, and notched to stop the crack spreading. It rang again in 1863 and has chimed, crack and all, ever since.
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