BY MARGARET A. McGURK
The Cincinnati Enquirer
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A craftsman watches 100,000 pounds of molten bronze as it is poured into the cast that will make the Millennium Peace Bell.
(Craig Ruttle photos)
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NANTES, France - With the delicate spin of a wheel, blue-clad workmen at La Fonderie de l'Atlantique tipped a pair of immense cauldrons downward. Liquid fire fell out, two searing ribbons of molten bronze. Moments later, the Millennium Monument World Peace Bell had taken shape.
Some 250 onlookers, including 70 from the bell's future home in Northern Kentucky, burst into applause. Chief craftsman Manuel Lopez, atop the giant frame that held the mold for the largest swinging bell in the world, smiled and lifted his hand in a shy salute.
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Wayne Carlisle applauds as the pouring is pronounced a success.
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"It brought tears to my eyes," said Wayne Carlisle, the chief operating officer and chairman of the Millennium Monument Co. So far, he is the chief sponsor of the $100 million Newport riverfront development where the bell is to ring its first public note on Dec. 31, 1999.
An hour later, he was still so moved he groped for words to describe what he sees in his imagination - a world-famous monument to inspire the shapers of a better, stronger world.
"It's not the cure; it's a beginning," he said. "It's a symbol of freedom and peace. In 20 or 30 years, it will go beyond anything."
David Hosea, Mr. Carlisle's partner in planning the Millennium Monument, found a simpler way to voice his feelings about the event. "It was Christmas," he said.
And so, in a way, it was. Throughout a day chockablock with ceremony, dignitaries including the governor of Kentucky, the mayors of Nantes and Newport, an emissary from the American Embassy in Paris and a delegate from the French Ministry of Culture invoked world world peace and international brotherhood. They even exchanged presents.
The idea of the bell was born almost exactly two years ago.
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The Millennium delegation, from left: Ky. Gov. Paul Patton; Wayne Carlisle; Pierre Paccard, owner of Fonderie Paccard; James Verdin, president of The Verdin Co., and Phillippe Paccard, directeur general of Fonderie Paccard.
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Mr. Carlisle and Mr. Hosea met with James Verdin, president of Cincinnati's venerable bellmaker, The Verdin Co., and some of the European experts who work with him. One was Frank Fritsen, of Verdin's subsidiary, Petit & Fritsen, who did not at first believe it possible to make a swinging bell of such size.
At 12 feet high and wide and 66,000 pounds, the bell is at least 6,000 pounds heavier than the largest new stationary bell, a behemoth created last year for a cathedral in Moscow.
"I remember sitting down at The Syndicate (in Newport) >
talking about a big bell, and these guys didn't want to do it. Especially this one," Mr. Hosea said with a nod toward Mr. Fritsen.
"Everything worked perfectly," Mr. Fritsen conceded at a reception for the dignitaries, Kentucky visitors and workers from the foundry.
Mr. Verdin told 50 European and American journalists it took "the cooperation of virtually everybody in the bell business in the world" to design and fabricate the Peace Bell.
The Verdin Co. owns the foundry where the bell was made. Only three other foundries in the world have the capacity for the job - in Mississippi, Montreal and Russia - and Mr. Verdin said he considered them all.
He said he settled on the Nantes facility in part because its equipment was best, and in part because his family emigrated to Cincinnati from France in 1842 to launch its bellmaking business. For the actual work of casting the bell, the Verdins enlisted Fonderies Paccard, a French firm with more than 200 years' experience in bellmaking. Their craftsmen joined the Fonderie de L'Atlantique team in the arduous work of bringing the Verdin design to life.
Mr. Verdin said the depth of experience among European bellmakers whose families have worked in the foundries for generations is the primary reason his company does not manufacture large bells in the United States.
A secondary reason, he said, is that is is difficult for a bronze foundry to meet OSHA standards in the United States.
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