Garden City ? One look around Charles Stones’ basement and it becomes readily apparent for whom the bell tolls.

The longtime Garden City educator and namesake of Charles O. Stones Intermediate Center has amassed a collection of more than 500 bells, including dozens of school bells used to summon children at the beginning of their school day and bring them back into the classroom from recesses and lunches.

Stones said he began collecting school bells about 50 years ago.

“I first started teaching in a one-room rural school in Smith County, and we had hand bells that we used to call the kids in with after recess and noontime. But those bells became so hard to find, I started to collect just any kind of bell,” Stones said.

Stones’ bells come in all shapes and sizes, from as small as a thumb to as big as a human head.

The walls of his basement are lined with numerous shelves that provide a home for school bells, cow bells, bicycle bells, liberty bells, dinner bells, service bells, ship bells and even an honorary Liberty Bell award plaque presented to him by lawyers for helping establish a law and order program in the Hugoton school system.

“It’s thought to be the only Liberty Bell award west of Hutchinson.” Stones said.

The bells are made from materials including silver, brass, ceramic, crystal, coal, wood and even volcanic ash.

Stones said he’s not quite sure where all the bells were made, but they do come from all over the world, from Turkey to the British Isles and all parts of the United States.

While Stones used to actively look for bells for his collection, many have come as gifts from family, coworkers and friends he’s met along the way.

He has a ship bell that his father-in-law bought him that is inscribed with the name “Tiantic” on the front. Stones said he doesn’t know if it is a spelling error or a humorous play on the name of the ill-fated vessel.

Stones also has dozens of cowbells, from tiny to almost a foot in height. There are cowbells with wooden clappers and even a bell shaped like a cow.

Perched on a shelf near the cowbells, Stones has a camel bell given to him from a friend who was serving in the military in Turkey. The elongated structure consists of several bells tied together in succession with each bell serving as a clapper for the one before it.

Stones said he really doesn’t have a favorite bell.

But he does have favorite stories behind some of the bells. Take, for example, the school bell given to him by his wife’s grandmother after she went to a rest home in Atwood. She had sold the bell to another resident at the home for $5.

“The bell was on the lady’s desk — days went on and days went on, weeks went on and months went on and she didn’t get her $5. So she went in there one day, got the bell and sold it to me for $5,” Stones said.