Unlike Grandfather’s clock, which stopped short never to run again when the old man died, it appears that London’s Big Ben will continue running after a brief rest.
"Big Ben, the landmark London clock renowned for its accuracy and chimes, stopped ticking for 90 minutes, an engineer said Saturday.
"Officials do not know why the 147-year-old clock on the banks of the River Thames stopped at 10:07 p.m. Friday. It resumed keeping time, but stalled again at 10:20 p.m. and remained still for about 90 minutes before starting up again, a spokeswoman for the House of Commons said on condition of anonymity, citing government policy.
"There has been speculation a recent spell of hot weather may have been to blame. Temperatures in London reached 90 Saturday, and forecasters called it England’s hottest day in May since 1953."
By the way, if the musical allusion interests you, GET THE LYRICS. My grandparents occasionally sang this song for me when I was a child and the idea of a clock stopping to mark someone’s death — time standing still in mourning — always fascinated me.
Actually, I understood that Big Ben was the 13-ton bell inside of the big clock, not the clock itself. So it is impossible for Big Ben to “tick”. 🙂
I read the song differently when I was a tyke – I thought that the clock was patiently counting out the seconds of the old man’s life, all ninety years of it, and spent a few sleepless nights thinking that there was some clock out there ticking away my own life.
The legend of a clock stopping at the point of ones death is popularly attributed (wrongly – it didn’t happen) to Thomas Edison who died in 1931.
However it did happen in my own house when my beloved mother-in-law died last year – the clock on our dresser stopped at precisly 12:15am, the moment she died. We haven’t fixed it to this day.
“My grandparents occasionally sang this song for me when I was a child and the idea of a clock stopping to mark someone’s death — time standing still in mourning — always fascinated me.”
Slightly OT . . .
My Gramma Phebe – my Dad’s Mom, the only grandparent I knew – used to sing that song to me when I was a little kid. I would cry & cry the minute she started it. I think of the song often & knew the allusion as soon as I read the post’s headline. Phebe (no “O”, please!) was a character. A real Annie Oakley type, she’d go hunting with the men & clean the animals they shot. There’s pictures of her in buckskins & boots with a shotgun & dead deer next to her. She was a very cool lady.
For alternate lyrics, go here http://tinyurl.com/aq48k and scroll down to “Frank Hayes Version” They are euphemized from Frank Hayes’ original lyrics and could be euphemized further if one wanted.
We love this song and sing it to our kids often. I hope I’m not traumatizing them!
OT = ‘off the topic’, right? I kept reading ‘Old Testament’ and couldn’t make sense of it until today. Silly me. Got to get caught up on the lingo.