STEEPLEJACKS

Shannon News, 21 May 1926, Page 1

STEEPLEJACKS

TALES PROM THE HEIGHTS William Larkins is a steeplejack, and has published a book about his calling. Some interesting extracts are given by an appreciative ‘Times’ Literary Supplement reviewer. It is a popular belief that a steeplejack lives with his heart in his mouth but even that is untrue; "when accidents happen is it rarely nerves that are at fault; it is usually that caution has been lacking." So with such furtlicre assumptions as that steeplejack ing is a job for young men rather than old, and especially for sailors; young men, it appears, are less carful than the veterans, and as for sailors, “generally they make but poor teeplejacks;’’ they are unhappy .with all that land about them; a leeshore complex, perhaps. “A really efficient steeplejack. ...” (writes Mr. Larkins) has to be a mason, a mechanic, a copper-worker scaffolder, carpenter, painter. He must, too, learn seating, g;olf-leaf laying, soldering, sign-writing, and the principle of clocks; and he must do all these things, that other workmen do on the ground, mostly hanging suspended in mid air. For these reasons, and for others that I need not specify, I do not think that any properly qualified steeplejack.... has much, if anything, to fear from feminine competition.” Adventurous Gii'ls. Yet the Jills, are responsible for one or two of the most interesting passages in the book. It is not only that clergymen's daughters—notoriously an adventurous breed—have "on several occasions” expressed themselves delighted when piloted by Mr. Larkins up the steeple of their fathers’ churches, but that there are a good many wo'men who have climbed without being specially conducted. Among them is "Little Bessie;” her father had reguilded the ball on the top of the steeple at Repton; the vicar and churchwardens, impressed by the accomplishment of a dangerous feat, presented him with a new suit of .clothes; desiring, no doubt, to make such return as was in his power, the steeplejack announced in the public house, where he would don the clothes on top of the ball. This the next day he proceeded to do; once more he climbed up to the narrow platform he had made below the hall, flung up from it a looped rope, so that it caught on the arm of the cross 6ft. above the bulge of the intervening, ball. swarm6d up the hope and threw down his discarded garments one by one. Perhaps his potations still affected him; at any rate, he threw the rope down, too, and remained marooned, clinging frantically to the cross. His daughter, Bessie, was sent for, and how she got another rope up to him makes a fine tale. Molten Lead Spray. Some of the .tales are examples of an agreeable bravado; the point of others lies in presence of mind in facing unexpected danger, and the best of them turn on the saving of life, Lewis and Jenkins were repairing a weather vane 180 ft from the ground; when Lewis, standing on his mate’s shoulders, was pouring melted lead into the socket a gust of wind scattered it in a shower over the bare arms that supported him; had Jenkins flinched one, and probably both, would have fallen; but h e made no movement or even sound. Lewis did not know what had happened until after descending he saw Jenkins's arms; “they were ringed about with ‘ angry livid marks, roughly resembling bracelets, where the flesh had been burned away.” j Throwing Chimneys.

So much foi’ the human side. What Mr. Larkins has to say of the mechanical side of the profession of which he is at the head is no less instructive. The top of the Nelson Column is a cemetery ,for pigeons? Birds, and especially jackdaws, peck at mortar, and are responsible for much of iho damage that steeplejacks have to rectify. But the top may be held by more formidable enemies; Mr. Larkins was beaten back by the bees which, to the annoyance of the congreagation, had taken possession of the tower of a parish church; and he has had no liking for a task which he has had several times to undertake the extirpation of the venerous flying ants that eat woodwork. He seldom knows what he is wanted for: —A telegram, 200 miles by rail, 200 ft by. ladder, the vicar's wife in hysterics, and her cat mewing at the top of the steeple. At the other end of the scale are chimneys costing thousands of pounds all that may be.lost if repairs costing fewer pence are not done in time. In certain conditions a chimney that leans may be straightened, and Mr. Larkins tells how it is done. "Throwing- chimneys” is an art; Mr. Larkins lias devised a system by which he fells them as if they were trees, and he undertakes, under heavy penalties that all the wreckage shall fall within a small prescribed space. As he describes steeplejacking, it is not only a trade, but a sport and a spectacle; .20,000 people turned out to sec him “throw” a giant chimney at Aidershot.