Westminster Abbey, historic shrine of the British Commonwealth, resting place of her kings and heroes, is being wired for sound. The impression made by the extensive public address system which was installed for the Coronation ceremony in May was so favourable that work is now progressing on a permanent install: tion. The system for the Coronation and for peri anent installation is supplied and installed by Standard Telephones &ą Cables, Ltd, manufacturing subsidiary in London of the Internatior 1 Telephone and Telegraph Corporation.
Six microphones and 70 amplifiers are involved. The system is regarded as one of the most complete and most modern in use anywhere. Special installation problems are being met in the placing of the loud speakers, It has been possible to locate most of them so that they are invisible to the audience, but where this might impair the performance of the equipment, the speakers have been finished to match exactly their surroundings.
Without amplification, se ices are almost entirely inaudible parts of the Abbe;
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.