Happy Birthday To You, Happy Birthday To You,

and whose is it? why Big Ben's! on the 31st. May, the lift was invented in 1850, but was still too new in 1859 for the clock we know as Big Ben to include such an amenity, the 13.5-ton copper and tin bell which – as every nerdy child knows – is Big Ben, not St Stephen’s Clock Tower which houses it, the “bong” measures 118 decibels, Big Ben’s appeal is intriguing, it is the biggest chiming clock tower in the world, but in terms of size it is easily beaten, the clock face on the top of the Royal Liver Building in Liverpool is bigger, worldwide, it looks like a wrist-watch compared to the clock on the Abraj Al Bait Towers in Mecca whose face, when finished, will measure 80 metres to Big Ben’s puny 6.9 metres, a few Big Ben Facts, The clock started keeping time on May 31 1859; the bells began ringing on July 11. Each face is lit by 27 low-energy, radio-controlled bulbs. The “Westminster” chimes were copied from Great St Mary’s in Cambridge. St Stephen’s Clock Tower was built without scaffolding, from the inside out. Tunnelling for the Jubilee line left the tower leaning 220mm (8.66 in) to the North-West, all together now, one more chours of Happy Birthday! British and Proud of it!