Thieves steal 800-pound antique bell from Ballard Elks Lodge

Geeky Swedes Ballard

A 130-year-old brass bell that sat in front of the Ballard Elks Lodge on Shilshole Bay was stolen over the weekend.

Somehow thieves had loaded up the 800-pound bell from its resting spot in front of the lodge. Members reported the crime to police, hoping it was just a prank. Then when they started calling scrap yards in the area out of precaution, they made a sad discovery.

Recycling Depot in Georgetown told them that it received pieces of what appeared to be a brass bell.

“It’s really tough to decipher what’s stolen and what’s not stolen,” the manager of Recycling Depot told KIRO 7 when the TV station called. “We like to help as much as we can with something like this.” He said they bought the pieces for about $200.

It’s unclear how many pieces of the bell will be recovered. One member on Facebook said the bell originated from the Fremont Fire Marshall years ago.

In the meantime, Ballard Elks members said they’re putting up security cameras.

Geeky Swedes

The founders of My Ballard

74 thoughts to “Thieves steal 800-pound antique bell from Ballard Elks Lodge”

  1. Huh.
    I wonder WHO would be stealing scrap metal?
    Certainly not our beloved camping tweakers…
    Seattle, where is your dignity?

    1. Yeah, you’re probably right. I mean look at it. It’s practically the shape of a dome tent. Also, EXTREMELY portable and easy to be carried away by one or two campers. Most definitely a homeless person.

      Certainly not some homed junkies (who grew up here) driving around in a van or something.

      1. Yeah, which is why we should PAY to let the junkies slam dope at “safe injection” sites. These RV campers often have several vehicles.
        The dumb is strong in this one.

        1. And if it turns out to be drunk frat boys or high schoolers? Will Safe Seattle apologize? Will they change their attitude? Realize that we don’t live in a gated community?

          Nope.

          It makes no difference. If you can blame someone living on the street, in an encampment, whatever, GREAT! Every case where one of them gets blamed is more ammunition for you. On the other hand, what if it wasn’t? That doesn’t exonerate all poor people from the hypothetical idea that they cause more crime. So? Full speed ahead.

          So there’s only two kinds of headlines: the kind that further demonize the poorest people, and those that are irrelevant. In your world, there’s nothing that could happen that would stop you from attacking them.

          Class hatred can’t be stopped by facts. It feeds on itself.

          2. Are you dillusional? Your ideology is flawed. Most of the urban RV population DONT WANT OUT of their situations and are a massive burden to the businesses they park in front of and in some cases steal from.

            This isn’t class warfare. It’s a city gone to hell because it says yes to everything and is terrified to do otherwise.

          3. Look here the facts are simple and it has all the markings of what these junkies do. I have no sympathy for these junkies infact I am at a point where I feel citizens need to step up and Chase them out of town

          4. Now you’re thinking. Because when has vigilantism ever turned into a debacle?

          5. Pull that tampon out. You’re starting to exhibit symptoms of tss

  4. O’Brien’s kids are the gift that just keep on giving.

    Elenchos to dismiss the bell as a “racist historical object” in 3…2…1…

    1. Just post under your real name, Harley. Nobody believes all these fake sock handles are real. It’s obvious it’s you.

      Also: get out of the house! Get a JOB! There’s more to life than My Ballard. Call your mother.

    1. “…lovely, diverse, vibrant camper swine” – I do like that term! Wait until they figure out how to melt down bicycle frames they have ravaged into unidentifiable pieces of metal. I also like the term “O’Brien’s kids.” That kind of says it all too, don’t you think?

      2. elenchos, you are a major creep for posting someone’s real name in a public forum no matter what their political leanings. You are just another political terrorist. I hope you get charged with a crime like harassment. Maybe someone will post your real name here someday and you will lose your anonymity and see how it feels. Maybe you do not even mind telling everyone your real name if you think it is OK?

        1. Yes, we subsidize the political terrorists, their cousins who leave paradise to come to “evil America” for the free stuff, and the “good boys going to college” who shoot people because they think they’re rap stars.

          Leftism is the political equivalent to fast food.

  7. Well I guess we should just file this one in the Department of “Things You Never Thought You Would Have To Nail Down To Keep Safe From The Tweakers.”

      1. That’s interesting, Elenchos. Go ahead, prove it. Provide a shred of evidence.

        It would be liike me calling you a sock puppet for Erica “C is for Crank” Barnett.

        1. Actually, unhinged homophobe lunatic Elenchos is doing more to keep Harley’s name in front of readers than any number of roadside posters might have done when he ran for mayor. Maybe I’m Harley, too! Just like Spartacus, I say, “I AM HARLEY LEVER!”

    1. Scrap yards are supposed to be vigilantly on the lookout for stolen metal. They should shoulder some responsibility if they did not get ID. Some yards even photograph license plates from sellers’ cars. Anyway, thanks Ray for, literally, the only coherent comment on this board.

    2. Harley Lever? Maybe. Probably. Go outside. Exercise. Turn the damn computer off and spend some time with all those job applications you told your mom you were going to fill out.

  10. I know the Geeky Swedes once asked this before, but I would suggest it’s time to just do away with user comments on this site. You could post something about a lost cat or the time and temperature… and the result would still be the same. The trollers will be fine… they’ll just move on to some other online site where they can find meaning and purpose with the same tired snarky comments. Bore me.

      1. You libs can’t handle honesty.

        This coming from the man, who runs a Facebook page, where the sole source of news is MyNorthwest. That’s rich, Harley.

        1. Truth, this “Harley” guy sure has set up shop in your head. Are you hearing voices, too?
          No worries if you are, just hang out in front of Starbucks with a “Harley Lever is EvIl!” cardboard sign so the idiot yuppies will give you money.
          FULL EMPLOYMENT

          1. If you aren’t Harley Lever, you sure are doing a perfect impression:

            Step 1: Convince yourself that the City has become a desolate wasteland.
            Step 2: When reality and other people don’t agree with your delusions, go on various neighborhood blogs and rapidfire post deranged sockpuppet comments, in a failed attempt to convince others of your delusion.
            Step 3: Play the victim when STILL nobody believes you.
            Step 4: ???
            Step 5: Profit!

            Go outside Harley. Turn off the computer, enjoy the weather, enjoy life. You only get the one.

    2. Maybe disable anonymous comments? At the moment it feels like a small handful of…committed participants are using multiple handles to make the same (tired) points over and over on every.damn.thread.

      I don’t hide behind a mask while talking to my Ballard neighbors in real life, why should we here?

      For the actual story, is there a fundraiser or something we could do to replace the bell? I would totally pitch in as to “here’s another 800 pounds of metal, donated by your decent neighbors, both online and IRL”

      1. How about we disable the idiotic political agendas of certain misguided groups and vote out their corrupt patrons in City Hall?

        I can’t help but notice that as the Head Tax was defeated, and Sawant and Bagshaw are on the way out, the Alt-Left are getting nervous about letting people speak freely about this disgusting corrupt mess they’ve created.

    3. Acquaformosa is 100% correct. They either need to turn off the comments or moderate the comments.

      There are actual places on the internet where decent, reasonable discussion can take place in the comments sections (it’s rare) but it only happens if the people who run the site care enough to 1) set rules (like staying on topic or no ad hominin attacks), and 2) actually enforce the rules in order to keep conversations from turning into the garbage-fest that is 90% of internet comments. That’s means deleting comments that stray from the rules. Eventually, when they realize none of their trash comments stay up, the trolls move on to another site where they can shout at the stars.

      It’s disingenuous to suggest that you don’t like the tone of the comments on your website when you’re unwilling to moderate them in any way, shape, or form.

      Geeky Swedes… it’s your website. It’s up to you as to what you want it to represent. At the moment, all it represents are cesspool comments threads.

      2. Here’s is your “free speech liberal” tone policing because the city is currently a corrupt mess enabled by cult-ish folks who prefer “fake nice” over stark, realistic assessments.

        Hey be sure to keep your dog baby’s mess off the sidewalks, thanks.

          2. Harley Lever founded the Safe Seattle FB page. I believe he started the site after he confronted some tweakers who stole his TV and threatened to kill him. Of course, the cops didn’t do anything about it. He also ran for mayor last election but wasn’t allowed in any of the debates. Gotta have hand-picked candidates, right?.

            I don’t know him well but I’ve met him a few times. He’s a totally decent likable guy. (No, Elenchos, I am not Harley.) And I bet he knows far more about the opioid epidemic and has had way more tragic connections with it than any of you posers pontificating on the site with your thieving junkies are “vulnerable community nembers” nonsense.

          3. Oh, this Harley sounds like a monster. I hope we can get enough violent junkies and their enablers mobilized to stop comments on websites, and force us all to raise taxes to feed their precious toddler- chomping pit bull babies.

            Don’t want anyone calling us “intolerant” for G-d’s sake. I enjoyed seeing the 12 cops and firefighters attempting to revive a tent junkie near the Fremont ship canal today. Seattle magic!

          4. He also ran for mayor last election but wasn’t allowed in any of the debates.

            Right, it was the establishment and the media that caused you to not get elected…

            And I bet he knows far more about the opioid epidemic…

            If only we had listened to you, Harley, we wouldn’t be in this mess!

          5. Who is more insane, the junkies and meth head lunatics or the idiots who think taxes will make them all magically become functional citizens? Comedy!

            You progressives in Seattle have turned into the Flat Earth Society on social issues.

          6. Who is more insane, the junkies and meth head lunatics or the idiots who think taxes will make them all magically become functional citizens? Comedy!

            Option 3: The Next Door/Safe Seattle people who shout down any and all solutions, whilst failing to offer their own.

            Other countries have shown that properly funded services can vastly reduce or eliminate the homeless, mentally ill and drug addicts off the street. But that for some reason triggers you, Harley.

          7. Truth, talking to invisible people again.

            You cite “European” social solutions when you aren’t decrying the “racism” of people whom are of European descent and prefer high trust, safe communities. Ballardites want Scandi cleanliness and orderly behavior?
            OH NO WHAT MONSTERS MUST STOP THE MADNESS

            In any case, giving hundreds of million$ to the inept grifters at City Hall people is about as smart as, well, giving $10k to a junkie and expecting them not to slam it all in their arm. You’re part of the bamboozle industry, Truth. Face it. Grifters and liars.

          8. Thank you for proving that Option 3 is in fact the most insane group in the City, Harley. Get well soon!

          9. Hating your taxpaying neighbors because they do not want to subsidize junkies seems to be a characteristic of many Leftists. Oddly, most conservatives are cool with gay marriage, liberation, etc but for some reason you guys are just allergic to sanity when it comes to FORCING PEOPLE to pay their local burglars, and you stoop to a form of political blackmail which consists of a two pronged strategy:

            1) Pretend crime hasn’t increased, while also
            2) Attributing increased crime to lack of funding and insist we all pony up and that we’re all to blame for the criminals.

            PATHETIC

          10. Harley, your class hatred is best revealed by your repetitive bleating about taxpayers this and taxpayers that. You think you represent taxpayers and everyone who is poorer than you doesn’t pay taxes.

            In Washington, and especially Seattle, the tax burden falls heaviest on the poorest class. The extreme regressiveness of the taxes here is one of the main reasons you find yourself the victim of having to look upon people who are very poor in neighborhoods where you believe the very poor do not belong.

            Are you ever going to explain all the evidence against this crime wave nonsense? The high property values, the increase in businesses, the influx of people who want to live here, even at ever increasing housing costs? The low unemployment and rapid growth in job creation? The high ranking in multiple livability surveys. Oh, and the actual crime data. The crime rate itself says you’re wrong.

            No data says you’re right. None. We don’t even have a single outlier statistic hinting there might really be a hidden crime epidemic. We have a unanimous pile of evidence that there is no crime wave. And in particular, the upper middle class privileged neighborhoods that are the focus of the Safe Seattle/Nexdoor paranoia, crime is especially low.

            Everywhere you look, we see indicators of a place with LOW crime, not high, and certainly not crime spiraling out of control. Every kind of evidence there is says you’re wrong, and you won’t address that.

          11. Talk to local police, Elenchos. And stop expecting your “racist” neighbors to pay for junkies and other assorted criminals.

            “The low unemployment and rapid growth in job creation?”

            Huh, so there are JOBS AVAILABLE? Why are there campers everywhere stealing everything and demanding we pay for them?

            More Leftist cognitive dissonance on display:

            1) Capitalism is the cause of all problems, which is rooted in “white privilege” “patriarchy” etc Marxism is good etc

            2) We’re in a “2nd Great Depression” and desperately need whopping tax increases to support the downtrodden.

            3) Seattle is at full employment thanks to Leftist policies, not capitalism, and the city is flush with jobs

            4) Now that we’re flush with jobs we need a head tax (payroll tax) to “house” the junkies, and that tax that will not affect the number of middle and lower wage jobs in the area. Other taxes are design to penalize: soda pop, liquor, cannabis, but the head tax will somehow not perform same function. Magic!

            5) There aren’t any jobs for the junkies, but if there were, they would surely show up on time and perform duties between breaks to slam heroin or smoke meth.

            SOUNDS PRETTY COGENT.
            Tell me Elenchos, what field do you work in?

          12. People like you do everything you can to make it impossible to get off the street. You don’t want anyone to transition to more stable housing, like tiny houses. You balk at any effort to provide consistent access to showers, or clothing. You want everyone with a criminal record to simply vaporize. They can’t live *anywhere* as far as you’re concerned.

            How’s anybody supposed to get hired, let alone get to work every day, when there are obstacles at every turn? And every time anyone wants to remove one of those obstacles, you attack them.

            An then of course we have the fundamental problem: low supply of housing. The only solution to having insufficient housing is to build more. And what do you guys do every single time you see an apartment building under construction? You flip out. The main obstacle to adding hosing is Nextdoor, Safe Seattle, and their spokestroll Harley Lever.

            The fact is, you hate them for even existing. You hate them for not having homes, you hate them for not having jobs. You especially hate anyone with a past, whether it’s drugs or jail or immigration. You hate them and want them to suffer. What makes you angry isn’t your tax burden, it’s helping them. A tax on the richest companies that wouldn’t have affected you at all had you outraged because of where the money was going: helping the people you hate.

            There is no evidence anyone is “stealing everything”. None.

            If you lived here 15 years ago, have FOUR TIMES the likelihood of your car being stolen. The burglary rate was double. Go back 25 years and you’d have had your house broken into THREE TIMES as often.

            You’re crazy. Reality proves you’re crazy. And your only motive is hate. You hate the poor, you hate helping anyone, and you basically hate Seattle. Seattle is a liberal town, and has been for decades. It is run on liberal policies. You despise the place, and everyone here.

            And it shocks you that nobody here listens to you. Why should the? You’re not our friend. You’re nothing like us.

          13. Hey Elenchos, tell that to the guy who had to shoot a burglar in Loyal Heights.
            You guys are pathetic and dangerous.

  11. I do remember seeing this bell in front of the Elks, although I am not a member. I knew it was old but did not know the history of the bell. This is a loss to the community and the Elks as it can never be replaced.
    Also, several weeks ago I sold non stolen scrap metal to a recycler in south Seattle. They ask you for your ID and they photocopy it. They do not give out cash if over a certain amount, they issue you a check. The police should be able to track who sold the metal.

  12. What kind of equipment did they have to not only get this 800-pound bell into a vehicle, but to do it without being detected? Dang. Sorry for the loss, that’s a real shame.

  13. Nice to have homeless campers so we don’t have to blame black people, right? Oh Seattle, though art the home of the faux-liberal, spoiled rotten, passive-aggressive windbag.

  14. An 800# brass bell…. and people think that homeless people took it? This is the work of professional thieves. Similarly, when Ballard locals post videos of burglars stealing packages off of their porches, the burglars are not homeless people: they are composed & determined professional thieves.

    2. Organized thieves have been hitting the food trucks and retail so hard they have made formal statements to the City Council. Yes, it involves people who live in the RV’s. Yes, many of the addicts are “professional thieves”. That people are unaware of this, or in denial about it, says a lot about the dim bulbs in this town.

  15. Isn’t it great how every time something is posted, you people (most likely men, as it usually turns into a pissing contest) only post solid bitching and call others stupid? Is this all you have going for you in life??

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