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Its Victorian chimes are broadcast around the world curticy of BBC radio, and are supposedly based on four notes from Handle’s “Messiah”.  
 
The Tower is 314 feet high, which is about sixteen stories high, and has become one of London’s most famous landmarks.  
 
Entering the Bell Tower to view Big Ben is restricted because of security reasons, but if you were to enter you would notice an absence of a vertical transport vehicle, but instead you must climb 334 winding limestone stairs.  
 
At the top is housed the sonorous main Bell called Big Ben which has lent its name to the whole structure, the Chimes ring out on the quarter hour from an intricately ornamented Belfry. The Bongs of Big Ben peel every hour to inform its audience of the time of day.  
 
In the beginning the clock, and tower had many difficulties. Construction troubled with delays, budget overruns, and Bureaucratic squabbling.  
 
The tower was badly designed, and turned out to be too small to house the Clock machinery. The copper and tin main Bell weighed 16.25 tons, but had to be scrapped after it cracked during testing.  
 
It was forged again but in a slimed down version, and painstakingly hoisted to the top of the Tower.  
 
The minute hands had to be replaced not once but twice because they were so heavy that they could not circle the clock face.  
 
On May 31st 1859 the clock officially started keeping time. Big Ben started Tolling a few days later, but within months it again cracked, and did not resume service until 1862.  
 
Notes:  
The origin of the name, “Big Ben” is in dispute.  
 
The term, “sonorous” means, loud, deep, or resonant.  
 
In 1952 was the Queens Coronation, and I was a young boy of twelve years. My father was a London Bobby, and at his Police Station they held a draw for tickets to view the Coronation procession.  
 
My father won one ticket, and I went to London to claim my space on the pavement below Big Ben. Just before the procession approached the call was put out, “all children move to the front.”  
 
So I did much to the protests of the short women behind me, I was a very tall boy. It was a great procession, and when it had passed I caught a Double Decker Bus home, and watched the ceremony on TV, black and white of course.  
 
Source:  
 
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7339242.stm