Grandfather saves clock with timely intervention

Clock winder Godfrey Allanson had made a 20ft climb every week for 43 years to ensure the antique hands on the church tower kept perfect time.

But when the 73-year-old bell ringer wanted a younger man to learn the ropes he was told a risk assessment would be needed before anyone else took his place on the on the 8ft by 4ft platform.

It was thought it would be far too dangerous to ask anyone 
else to climb up the rickety ladder – let alone spend ten minutes 
with both hands on the winding handle perched high above the pews.

Parish officials did not think the church would allow alterations to the Grade II listed All Saints’ at Muston, near Filey, to make the access comply with modern safety standards.

But Mr Allanson, whose father Alfred, a farmer, had wound the clock before him, was horrified by the thought that the 1886 mechanism could be left to run down for good.

So he turned to Scarborough Council whose duty it is to maintain church clocks – and they provided a £3,500 grant to connect 
it to the mains electricity supply.

Mr Allanson, a retired painter and decorator, said: “When my father did it a lot of people didn’t even have radios.

So they would set their pocket watches by the clock and tell him off if it was a minute slow.

“He did it for £10 a year and I did it for the same until someone on the parish council said I shouldn’t get paid so after that I did it for nothing for 15 years.”

The clock now quietly 
rewinds itself every 15 minutes 
so someone only has to go up twice a year to reset the hands for the start and end of British Summer Time.