Thomas carefully climbs the steps next to the furnace. The molten metal is bubbling at 1500◦ C. The white-haired man stretches out his hand, feeling the heat. “It’s low; it needs more.” His son and his nephew respond immediately, running to add more metal to the pot before stepping away.
The atmosphere is stiflingly hot. Through a small widow, we can see the metal fighting the fire, and succumbing slowly to its power. At the end of the process, a ton of copper and tin has been transformed into a thick orange-red liquid.
The molten metal which will be poured carefully into molds is the raw material for the Galanopoulos brothers’ famous bells. From their workshop in Paramythia in Thesprotia, their bells, large and small, have traveled to the far corners of the earth: Greece, Germany, Kenya, Tanzania, Australia and the United States. They make more than a thousand bells a year.
The Galanopoulos family workshop is one of two remaining bell-makers in Greece. The craft is slowly dying out, but the Galanopoulos brothers persist. Their story is one of striving and survival.
