The government has spent over $10 million to do up the national war memorial bell tower that plays for fallen soldiers. Photo: RNZ / Rebekah Parsons-King
The government spent over $10 million to do up the country's bell tower that plays for fallen soldiers, but is now getting rid of the only person who plays it.
The country's sole carillonist, Timothy Hurd, has been playing the bells - 74 of them, totalling 70 tonnes, spanning six octaves - for about 40 years in a bell tower that is now the centrepiece of Pukeahu National War Memorial Park in Wellington.
Hurd used to play them three times a week.
But once the tower reopened after seismic-strengthening early next year, that would be cut right back.
"Our intention is to have the carillon played every Anzac Day," the Ministry of Culture and Heritage said.
When RNZ queried this, it added, "Our intent is for the bells to play on Anzac Day, and perhaps at other ceremonies."
Heritage NZ said because Pukeahu was run by the ministry, it had no comment.
Scaffolding encases the bell tower. Photo: RNZ / Phil Pennington
Historian Stephen Clarke expressed disbelief.
"For whom the bell tolls really does have meaning at the national carillon, and for them to go silent is tantamount to forgetting," he said.
The tower is scheduled to reopen by Anzac 2026, and Hurd's job is set to be disestablished that same week.
This followed months of him working to refurbish the complicated instrument and advising builders how to strengthen the bell frame.
"Oh, it's totally perverse," said Clarke. "You know, 'thanks and no thanks' - it is disgusting."
The ministry refused to discuss individual jobs "while we are still going through a change process".
Historian Dr Stephen Clarke. Photo: Supplied
Crowdfunding bells
A century ago, people flocked to sponsor a bell for the new tower, in a 1920s form of crowdfunding.
The initiative was so popular that the families of fallen soldiers were put first in line.
"The bells were to commemorate particular campaigns and units and they're named for those, and they were donated by families in loving memory," said Clarke.
"Including [writer] Katherine Mansfield's parents, who donated the bell 'Flanders Fields' in memory of their only son killed in Belgium in 1915."
But earthquake strengthening work at the tower had silenced the bells for seven out of the last 10 years.
Wendy Collings of Newtown, walking through the park on Thursday, said she really missed hearing them.
"Yes I do. It is a lovely something that was specially Wellington, and I would hear them when I was walking through this way, from way down the road."
Bikers Dan and Chris were sheltering from the wind in a nook under the scaffolded tower. Had they ever heard the bells?
"A long time ago, yeah ... I don't remember what they sound like," said Dan.
The opening of the Carillon War Memorial on Anzac Day, 1932. Photo: Alexander Turnbull Library / Ref: 1/1-037959-F
Open and shut
The tower was due to reopen by next Anzac day.
At the same time, the carollinist's job was being disestablished.
"The decision has been made to disestablish the carillonist (deferred until the end of April 2026)," said an internal ministry report in July.
The ministry, its funding cut in Budget 2025, could not afford such a specialist role, secretary Leauanae Laulu Mac Leauanae wrote.
He had opted to cut about two dozen jobs to save money and to focus on core policy work, not public-facing tasks. Some historians' jobs were going, too.
The deferral until April 2026 allowed time for Hurd to finish refurbishing the metres-high instrument.
For him, that had included ages scrubbing rust off ball bearings, emails released under the Official Information Act (OIA) showed.
A graphic shows the intricacy of the earthquake strengthening work of the Carillon's upper bell frame. Photo: Supplied / Ministry of Culture and Heritage
'How they gonna play it?'
The bike guys Dan and Chris were a bit perplexed.
"How they gonna play it if they're firing the person who plays it?" asked Dan.
"Play a recording of it from the past and just have the bells there for show?"
The ministry's internal report said it might hire a contractor to play it. Its website said the carillon would be "fully usable" once restored.
"We are still working through the details of how that will happen, as part of our change process," it told RNZ.
However, Clarke said he did not know of any carillon-playing contractors.
Hurd declined to comment.
An earthquake-prone building notice inside the Carillon. Photo: Supplied by Wellington City Council
'Dedicated'
The OIA emails showed the ministry up until now had leant heavily on Hurd's expertise, for advice and asking him to check pages of plans for new steel frames to replace the old ones, which were so rusty in places you could stick your finger through them.
He was also essential from 2016 to 2018 when all the bells were taken down, to start renewing the frame, and then the carillon reassembled.
"I mean, here's a gentleman that has dedicated his whole working life to New Zealand's national carillion," Clarke said.
"You're asking him to, you know, put it all back together - the only person who could do that in New Zealand.
"And then ... disestablish his position. I mean, what sort of employer is the Ministry of Culture and Heritage?"
The bell tower is the centrepiece of Pukeahu National War Memorial Park in Wellington. Photo: RNZ / Phil Pennington
'Part of the institution's aural landscape'
Hurd used to play the bells about three times a week, and even more in the 1990s, when an international fesitval went on for a month.
Playing it hardly at all was "dumb", said Collings.
"If you are going to play them at all, keep the carollinist in a job and keep them in practice."
Carillons in other cities are played regularly. "The University of Sydney War Memorial Carillon is a much loved part of the institution's aural landscape," said the university's website.
The Wellington tower is part of the global Network of War Memorial and Peace Carillons.
A network website said, "The carillon is played for regular concerts and commemorative events, continuing its role as musical centrepiece of the newly-created Pukeahu National War Memorial Park" with about "220 formal concerts per year".
An estimated 20,000 people attended the 2015 Anzac Day service at the Pukeahu National War Memorial. Photo: RNZ / Alexander Robertson
New national landmark
The bell tower opened in 1932 in front of thousands of people, becoming the centrepiece of the $120m Pukeahu National War Memorial Park in 2015.
Just last week, Pukeahu was recognised as only the second national historic landmark in the country.
The ministry lauded that.
It was "incredibly significant", said Leauanae.
It came after a saga with the bell tower work, reported extensively by RNZ for five years.
Expert reports that should have been essential from the start were never sought; expert advice that was sought was not followed; and a declaration by the city council in 2018 that the carillon tower was "sound as a bell" proved wildly off the mark when it had to be shut again in 2020, adjudged by a new lot of engineers as way below quake standards.
The cost included public access being disrupted, the bells not heard and bills of well over $10m.
The Carillon under construction in 1931. Photo: Alexander Turnbull Library / Ref: 1/2-090208-G
A university student at a cafe in nearby Egmont Street on Thursday could not recall ever hearing the bells, and she had this question:
"So, we're paying 10 million to fix a bell that's never going to be rung, apart [from] maybe once a year?"
The strengthening project was on a hurried path to be completed by next Anzac.
Sandblasting of the rusty upper bell frame was yet to start.
Dampers from Germany to ensure the tower swayed in a quake instead of snapping, would not be installed until October at the soonest.
The OIA emails showed a project beset by delays and some penny-pinching, too; this was characteristic of the earlier series of unsuccessful attempts since 2011 to fix it.
In one email a few months ago, the ministry asked Hurd for advice on what mesh screens to use to keep birds out, and said, "As there wasn't sufficient budget to replace all, only those that were in bad shape were being either patched or replaced."
However, the ministry has repeatedly defended its track record on the job.
"The Carillon Tower is currently being seismically strengthened so that it is preserved and protected for present and future generations of New Zealanders to enjoy," Leauanae said this month.
The RSA said it would be working with the ministry.
"The ringing of bells at the National War Memorial has historically played an important part in ceremonies commemorating New Zealand's fallen," the Returned and Services' Association said.
"Once the restoration is complete the RSA would welcome their inclusion in all major commemorations held at the National War Memorial."
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