On Wednesday September 22, 2016, a crew from Champion Crane Service out of Des Moines along with Verdin Bell Company came to Jefferson to bring down some of the bells from the Mahanay Bell Tower.  The Verdin Bell Company created the bells 50 years ago when Floyd Mahanay left money for the construction of the Bell Tower.  

Today the first step of the project was to bring down 9 striker-less bells lowered from the top of the Mahanay Bell Tower and load on a truck to be sent to the Verdin Company in Cincinnati to install the strikers.  The 15 other bells that were previously on display in the courthouse will also make the trip to Cincinnati.  This was all made possible with multiple grants and fundraising efforts to a total project cost of $440,000.  18 new bells will be casted to bring the total bell count to 33 which is a full carillon and will be one of four in the state.  

The follow are pictures and videos of the projects first step. You can see two workers on the top of the tower taking down the bells.  It got pretty windy as the day went along.  

IMG_6238

DJI_0125    DJI_0124 DJI_0106    DJI_0087 DJI_0081

Screen Shot 2016-09-22 at 10.59.36 AM

IMG_6252

Here are some videos flown with my drone. 

DJI_0127 DJI_0073 DJI_0090 DJI_0096 DJI_0128_2