St Mary's Cathedral Bell Had Been Stolen

The valuable and historic bell at St Mary’s Cathedral had been stolen. The bell is a memory of the Catholic Church of San Francisco. It survived the 1906 earthquake and fire. In 1962 it was torched by an arsonist. It was replaced with an electronic chime in the 1970s. It stood hard and strong for so many years and last month it was stolen by metal thieves. The bell is 122 year old and weighed 2.7 ton.

A parishioner noticed it was missing Sunday when he told everyone it wasn’t where it was supposed to be. Everyone realized they couldn’t remember seeing it for the last month. It must have been lifted by a crane and carted away by more than an average truck says police Inspector Brian Danker. Danker assumes it was stolen earlier but no one can remember exactly the last time they saw it. The bell is 5,300 pounds and 5 feet bigger than the Liberty Bell. The bell was made of 80 percent copper and 20 percent tin records show. If the bell is melted it’s worth about 75,000 dollars, it originally cost the church 17,000 dollars.

The church is offering a reward for anyone who helps return the bell or catch the thieves. The church isn’t sure if they can afford another and even if they replace the bell it wouldn’t be as special as the original one.

By Asiana Duong