The Secret Bell

Today Mr. Fenn started talking about bells - AGAIN! Alright enough already we get it, you have a secret bell, but how do we find it? Some of you may not fully understand Mr. Fenn's bell history throughout the chase, but it starts with For Whom the Bell Tolls in his book The Thrill of the Chase (TTOTC). The reason it is important (from a tangential aberration interceptor point of view) is that he purposely described the wrong war in Hemingway's book (WWI vs Spanish Civil War). It was actually the book Farewell to Arms that he was describing.

So what is it about bells that is so important? Well when he flew the F86 Sabre, he lived in a town called Belle-ville (just outside St. Louis - the city that has that rainbow like arch). I love the name of that town! In his book TTOTC he cast bronze bells and is burying them in hopes that they are found 1000s of years from now. In the book he says:

"Ring the bell loudly – for he who dies with over fifty dollars is a failure."

"If you should ever think of me, a thousand years from now, please ring my bell so I will know."

"Fortunately the bell rang about that time and I was out of there like a cannon ball on fire."

Then there is that famous story of flying over Philadelphia that changed his life, Philly houses the Liberty Bell.

As Forrest is a cancer survivor, the ringing of the bell is quite a significant symbol for it is a significant moment, a point in time that signals the end of active treatment and the beginning of a life free of cancer.

Now I last left off talking about stars as the key and I was just about to get into Chuck Yeager and his connection to all of this when I got busy with work. Chuck Yeager is the first man who broke the sound barrier and set many world flying records. The plane he broke the sound (listen good) barrier was the Bell X1.

Bell is also a manufacturer of helicopters and that phone with the tangled wires he sits waiting to ring, was invented by Alexander Graham Bell.

Now maybe some of you may have noticed that Mr. Fenn has a bell that hangs from his ceiling between the two book shelves in the middle of the window (over his left shoulder in the photo above). That bell was given to him by Eric Sloane ( a man mentioned often in the chase). Mr Fenn explained to me that "The bell in my window was found by Eric Sloane when it was eroding out of a barrancas near Taos."

Curious how this latest Scrapbook 172 talks of The Sound of Bells, a book written by Eric Sloane. So it leaves me pondering what exactly does the bell represent in Fenn's life? What does it represent in our lives? The answer may be in our state of mind.

There is one final Bell I left for the end. Remember when M.r Fenn gave the clue the treasure is not in eastern Saskatchewan? Well if you head dead south of Alameda (eastern Saskatchewan, my birthplace) you will run into a town called Bow Bells, ND. Only an hours drive from Minot - home of the B-52. Speaking of dead south, here is a song from eastern Saskatchewan's The Dead South showing off some of that beautiful eastern Saskatchewan landscape, complete with a rainbow over Bowbells.

#Bell #Sloane #LibertyBell #BellXI #AlexanderGrahamBell #B52 #BowBells