The Purdue Bell Tower is a 160-foot tall

bell tower A bell tower is a tower that contains one or more bells, or that is designed to hold bells even if it has none. Such a tower commonly serves as part of a Christian church, and will contain church bells, but there are also many secular bell tower ...

in the center of

Purdue University Purdue University is a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded in 1869 after Lafayette businessman John Purdue donated land and money ...

's campus. It was constructed in 1995 through a gift from the class of 1948.

Heavilon Hall Tower

The current Bell Tower's inspiration comes from the

that was part of the old Heavilon Hall, demolished in 1956. Heavilon Hall was dedicated on January 19, 1894, as part of Purdue's engineering school. Four days later, the building caught fire and was destroyed. In light of this tragedy, James H. Smart, Purdue's president at the time, declared that a new tower would go up "one brick higher." Smart's inspirational words have since become a sort of motto for the university. According to legend, however, the bell tower was actually built nine bricks higher. This second Heavilon tower was completed in December 1895 with clocks on each of the four sides. On April 8, 1897, four bells were installed. These bells would mark every quarter-hour until Heavilon was demolished in 1956.

Purdue Bell Tower

Through a gift from the class of 1948, a new bell tower was completed in 1995. The new tower stands 160 feet tall and, like the original, has a clock on each of its four faces. The bells from the original Heavilon tower hang at the top of the tower and are struck by electric clappers to ring at the hour, half-hour and end of classes. In addition, a computerized

carillon A carillon ( , ) is a pitched percussion instrument that is played with a keyboard and consists of at least 23 cast-bronze bells. The bells are hung in fixed suspension and tuned in chromatic order so that they can be sounded harmoniou ...

plays Purdue's

fight song A fight song is a rousing short song associated with a sports team. The term is most common in the United States and Canada. In Australia, Mexico, and New Zealand these songs are called the team anthem, team song, or games song. First associated ...

s and the alma mater at 12:20 pm, 5:00 pm, and 10:00 pm. At the base of the tower is a

time capsule A time capsule is a historic cache of goods or information, usually intended as a deliberate method of communication with future people, and to help future archaeologists, anthropologists, or historians. The preservation of holy relics dates ba ...

that is to be opened in 2095. Purdue BellTowerTimeCapsule

In 2008, the bell tower was incorporated into the university's

emergency notification system An emergency notification system is a method of facilitating the one-way dissemination or broadcast of messages to one or many groups of people, alerting them to a pending or existing emergency. The Emergency Notification System (ENS) was created by ...

. The tower now contains a

loudspeaker A loudspeaker (commonly referred to as a speaker or speaker driver) is an electroacoustic transducer that converts an electrical audio signal into a corresponding sound. A ''speaker system'', also often simply referred to as a "speaker" or " ...

and

siren Siren or sirens may refer to: Common meanings * Siren (alarm), a loud acoustic alarm used to alert people to emergencies * Siren (mythology), an enchanting but dangerous monster in Greek mythology Places * Siren (town), Wisconsin * Siren, Wisc ...

s that can be heard outdoors throughout the academic portion of campus. One legend about the Purdue Bell Tower states that the seal underneath it is cursed, and that any student who walks across the seal will not graduate in four years. It is also said that if a couple kisses under the tower, and then walk past the nearby Stone Lion Fountain, they will eventually be married. On November 27, 2018, during repairs to the tower, one of the clock faces fell from a crane during routine repairs, bounced off the basket of an

aerial work platform An aerial work platform (AWP), also known as an aerial device, elevating work platform (EWP), cherry picker, bucket truck or mobile elevating work platform (MEWP) is a mechanical device used to provide temporary access for people or equipment t ...

holding two workers, and hit the side of the tower on its way to the ground. No people were injured by the falling clock. The incident was captured on video.

References

External links

Heavilon Hall and Purdue Bell Tower
from Purdue's College of Liberal Arts

22-minute video, beginning with two minutes about the tower's dedication. {{PU Bell towers in the United States Towers completed in 1995 Clock towers in Indiana