They all lead busy lives, with calls from all over the country to inspect bell chambers. Nationwide, Whites maintain the bells of 150 towers, including most of the rings in the city of Oxford, in both colleges and other buildings, including the cathedral.

In 1958, when Brian joined the business, Whites was the only one in the country dealing exclusively with the hanging of the bells. Several others have since sprung up, but most need to pass the more specialised work to the firms with greater experience, and four of these sub-contract work out to Whites.

The second oldest company after Whites is one in Melbourne, Derbyshire, which was only founded in the late 1960s.

With the millennium year now past, 2001 has also been busy. During the summer, Brian was working on bells from the universities of both Oxford and Cambridge. Standing side by side at Appleton was the bell from Jesus College, Oxford, a chiming bell which has been returned to its newly refurbished turret -and a bell that will be hung for the first time at Clare College, Cambridge. This bell bears no date, just an engraving in mediaeval script, but it came from the now demolished home in Gloucestershire of the founder of the college, Elizabeth de Wymbish. It was 'rescued' and has been donated to the college, Also in the workshops have been the bells of St Mary's Church, Great Milton, a village near Thame in Oxfordshire, where the parish has been holding a year-long fund-raising campaign for the £34,000 cost of their refurbishment.

An invitation to Brian to give a talk in the village led to an interest in planning for their first re-tuning since 1902.

As most people only hear and rarely see their church bells, an open evening was held at the church after they had been lowered from the tower, and a good number of people came to see them at close quarters for the first time. The oldest bells date from 1683. Until recently, it was not possible to tune bells accurately, but the equipment now available means, says Brian, that, once they have been retuned, they will never go out of tune again.

After their preparation at Appleton, the Great Milton bells went for retuning to the famous Whitechapel Bell Foundry in London, and then returned to Whites for new ringing fittings.

By coincidence, a project next year will be at another Milton, near Abingdon, where the ring of six is to be taken down and sold - bells are never melted down or destroyed - to a church elsewhere. A new ring of eight will take their place in the tower at St Blaise church.

Just how much congregations think of their bells is reflected in the sums they need to raise. For example, a new bell of eight-inch diameter, at current prices, would cost £1,265 and a 60-inch bell £23,842. The heaviest bell at Great Milton weighs 18cwt, and the heaviest on which Brian has worked is one of three-and-a-quarter tonnes at St Paul's Cathedral.