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Ringing rocks are rocks that have the property of resonating like a bell when struck, such as the Musical Stones of Skiddaw in the English Lake District as well as the stones in Ringing Rocks Park, in Upper Black Eddy, Bucks County, Pennsylvania USA, the Ringing Rocks of Kiandra, near Cooma, NSW and also the Bell Rock Range of Western Australia. Ringing rocks are also known as sonorous rocks or lithophonic rocks, as used in idiophonic musical instruments called lithophones. ==Ringing Rocks Sites in Pennsylvania== Ringing Rocks County Park Ringing Rocks County Park is a Bucks County park in Upper Black Eddy, Pennsylvania at . Originally, the land was acquired by the Penn family from the Lenape (Delaware Nation) through the infamous 1737 Walking Purchase. It is not clear who made the original land warrant for the area now covered by the Ringing Rocks County Park. On the 1850 property map of Bucks County the owner appears to be Tunis Lippincott, however there is no warrantee listing under that name. The earliest published description of the Bridgeton boulder field is found in Davis 1876. The seven acre boulder field was purchased in 1895 by Abel B. Haring, president of the Union National Bank in Frenchtown NJ. Apparently Haring wished to protect the ringing rocks from development, and even refused an offer from a manufacturer of Belgian blocks for the right to quarry the stones. (Humphreys 1905, Sigafoos 1935). On August 22, 1918, the land which contains the Bridgeton boulder field was donated by Haring to the Bucks County Historical Society. The grant included 7 acres 8.08 perches of land. A right-of-way was granted by John O. McEntee for access to the park (Fackenthal 1919). Later the land was transferred to Bucks County and operated as a county park. Additional land acquisitions have increased the size of the park to 128 acres. Ringing Hill Park Ringing Hill Park is located three miles northeast of Pottstown, Pennsylvania in Montgomery County. The boulder field was first identified in 1742 when a road was cut between Pottstown and New Gosenhoppen (Pennsburg). In 1894 the Ringing Rocks Electric Railway Company was incorporated to purchase the remote Ringing Hill for an amusement park and provide trolley service (1894 to 1932). At the time it was created, the park was approximately two miles out of town. The park was purchased in 1932 by Walter J. Wolf and operated as an amusement park and skating rink. On September 1, 1957, the park was sold to the Ringing Hill Fire Company. (http://ringinghillfireco.org/history.asp) Stony Garden The Stony Garden, largest of the three public ringing rock boulder fields, is located on the northwest slope of Haycock Mountain in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, near Bucksville. The garden is actually a series of disconnected boulder fields which extend for nearly half a mile, and were formed where the olivine diabase unit crops out along the base of the mountain. The site is undeveloped, and is accessible by a hiking trail which leads from a PA Game Lands parking area on Stony Garden Road. It was purchased by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania around 1920 as part of PA Game Lands Tract #157 which covers Haycock Mountain. Early Investigations Several early scientists became interested in the ringing rocks, however none were able to formulate a credible theory on the ringing ability of the rocks or the formation of the boulder fields. The eminent Dr. Edgar T. Wherry (1885-1982), mineralogist and botanist, became interested in the ringing rocks while teaching at Lehigh University. Dr. Wherry theorized that the ringing was due to the texture of the diabase rocks and that they were supported by other rocks. He did identify the boulder fields as a type of felsenmeer (Wherry 1912). At the 13th Annual meeting of the BHS in June 1900 Charles Laubach (1835-1904), a noted local geologist and naturalist, described the geology of the diabase 'trap' sills with reference to the Bridgeton, Stony Garden and other sites (Doylestown Intelligencer 1900). Dr. Benjamin Franklin Fackenthal (1851-1941), local industrialist and trustee of Franklin & Marshall College, became interested with the ringing rocks. Although not a professional geologist, Dr. Fackenthal made extensive observations on all of the boulder fields (Fackenthal 1919). In 1965, geologist Richard Faas of Lafayette College took a few of the rocks back to his lab for testing. He found that when the rocks were struck they created a series of tones at frequencies lower than the human ear can hear. An audible sound is only produced because these tones interact with each other. Although Faas's experiments explained the nature of the tones, they did not identify the specific physical mechanism in the rock which made them. Buckwampun Historical Society Meetings The ringing rock boulder fields were popular places for meetings of the local Buckwampun Historical Society. Two annual meetings were held at the Bridgeton site (1893 and 1898), and one at Stony Garden (1890) (Sigafoos 1935). The Bucks County Historical Society also had a meeting at the Bridgeton site in 1919, the year after they acquired the property (Fackenthal 1919). At the third annual BHS meeting in June of 1890 a local physician, Dr. John J. Ott of Pleasant Valley, gave a musical performance using boulders taken from the Stony Garden boulder field. The suggestion for the construction of the lithophone was made by the historian William J. Buck. The rocks weighed approximately 200 pounds apiece, and apparently Ott was able to change their sound by slightly chipping the boulders. He played several selections using a steel hammer and accompanied by a brass band. "The clear, bell-like tones of the rocks could be heard above the notes of the horns." (Humphreys 1905, Fackenthal 1919, Sigafoos 1935 ). The tunes included "Home Sweet Home" and a composition of his own entitled "Sounds from the Ringing Rocks" - possibly a takeoff from the 1873 piano music score of the same name ( http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/ihas/loc.music.sm1873.08735/default.html ) 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「ringing rocks」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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