Marvin Spry Participates
In Sacred Music Festival
Marvin Spry of Birmingham.
Alabama, formerly of Cool
eemee. participated with nine of
his 20 bell, musical Bell Ringers
in the annual Sacred Music
Festival held in Birmingham on
November 27.
|L \ V
Marvin Spry Formerly of Cooleemee
Shoaf # Page, McClelland
Filter Plant Operators Learn Things About
Few people realize the pro
cesses which water goes
through from the river to their
house when they take a drink of
water.
This was the same position
Bill Shoaf, Judson Page and
• A \
11
Hayden Stiller, operator of the Filter Plant here for the
past 30 years, explains the process of how the water
enters the tanks in the filter plant to Bill Shoaf, Mack
Mr. Spry. Minister of Music a(
the Dawson Memorial Baptist
Church. Birmingham, says
bells can be one of the most
beautiful musical instruments
in the world, but just any old
bell will not do. Musical bells
Mac McClelland were in when
they accepted jobs as Filter
Plant Operators. None of the
men had ever experienced
working with "water."
Hayden Stiller, who with
many years of experience, had
have to be specially cast to tune
for this use.
The one thousand persons at
tending the last performance of
the 1970 festival were privileged
to hear some of these special
bells ring to music, under the
direction of Marvin Spry.
The nine ringers in the group
use American Bells, cast in
Sellersville. Pa., which is the
only place in America that this
type of bells are cast. They are a
30 octave set of 34 bells.
It appears that the bell ring
ers play from memory or that
they have some special "sixth
sense" to tell them when to ring
a certain bell, but they actually
use regularly written music.
Each bell has it's pitch
marked on the handle and the
minister of music numbers the
ringers. He then, marks each
sheet of music for each ringer.
Mr. Spry says the 20 bell
ringers from the Dawson Bap
tist Church is the largest group
of bell ringers.
Appearing with them in the
festival were two stars from (he
Lawrence Welk Show. Norma
Zimmer, Bob Ralston; The
Birmingham Civic Chorus and
the Birmingham Symphony Or
chestra. under the direction of
Amerigo Marino, participated
one night of the festival, also.
The Birmingham News and
the Birmingham Post Herald
sponsored the Festival this
year, wihh Bill Man as Emcee.
Marvin Spry is the son of Mr.
and Mrs. Granville Spry of Watt
Street, Cooleemee.
never had to train three new
men at one time therefore this
was proving to be a challenge
not only to the new men, but to
Hayden also.
Two of the new operators
should be no strangers to the
McClelland, and Judson Page. (Photo by James
Barringer)
Dp -/ic I ; j-.j
'•'ocVsvj.l le , 0 27028
64*h Year Wednesday, Dec 9, 1970 12 Pages
No 47 COCXEEMEE, NORTH CAROLINA 10 Cents
Best Looking
Debbie Potts and Danny Cor rail ware named by
Davie High'i senior class at 'Best Looking' in a
superlative selection recently announced. (Pho
to by James Barringer).
people of Cooleemee. Bill Shoaf
was employed formerly with
Burlington in the Finishing
Plant and Judson Page was a
supervisor in the Weaving De
partment. Mac McClelland, the
youngest member of the team,
ater
just completed an IK month tour
of Vietnam with the Army
While all the men are new to
the job, they have been learning
a lot about the operation over
the past five weeks Training
trips were taken to the Water
Plants at Lineolnton, Concord
and Salisbury spending two
days at each plant observing
and asking questions. When
they returned they were pre
pared to put into practice some
of the things they had observed
Each day one man assumes
the responsibility for operating
the plant while Mr. Stiller and
the other two operators look on.
Each trainee rotates each day
so he learns by doing. Part of
the training also involves the
making of bacteriological tests
to see that the water is safe to
drink and also chemical tests to
check for such things as the
acidity of the water, the residu
al chlorine content to be sure
that not too much chlorine is left
in the water from the purifica
tion process and other such tests
to insure that we get good drink
ing water.
Even after this phase of their
training, the men will be in
volved in a continuing training
program for the next few years
preparing to take tests for certi
fication as operators approved
by the American Water Works
Operators Association.
This is a professional certifi
cation program set up to insure
that qualified personnel are in
these responsible positions.
Environmental health is of
great importance to us all,
whether it be water we drink or
the air we breathe. The training
these men are receiving is one
of Burlington's efforts to
safeguard these vital resources