SIR – Of course Minehead would benefit from a swimming pool or even a pier as Mrs Middleton-Smith suggests (Your Letters March 4).

However, she is missing the point completely.

In times of economic stringency, the modest scheme for a clock tower is a realistic goal for a small local society to achieve within the time span available before the Queen's Diamond Jubilee which the clock tower will commemorate.

It follows an historic tradition which Sally Bainbridge has already referred to and creates a focal point at the junction of The Avenue and seafront.

Unlike some of the new public art recently commissioned in towns throughout Britain, the clock tower has functional use and in that way does benefit residents and tourists alike.

Its specification reflects the marine engineering and architectural traditions of piers and harbours and the building materials already in place on Minehead seafront.

Design is always going to be subject to personal preference, but one can argue that it is better to produce something of our own time rather than, as Mr Douglas Gregory suggests, "reproducing Exmouth's seafront clock".

Readers may not be aware that this is a much larger structure than that proposed for Minehead and is built in solid stone masonry designed with more than a hint of Victorian gothic revival. A retro design of this nature would increase the cost of the project out of all proportion and fall into the trap of pastiche.

I am old enough to remember when the wartime pillbox was still in place approximately where the clock tower is proposed to be sited. It was subsequently used, I believe, as a Minehead Urban District Council store for deck-chairs.

Out of reach of vandals on its wall and facing the Avenue was a clock given by a lady resident, Mrs Ponting-Baker.

As youngsters we would meet under the clock by arrangement and use it to remind us when it was time for us to go home. Maybe if we were lucky, we could afford a sixpenny wafer from the ice cream seller nearby.

The building was in due course demolished but the clock was never replaced.

As someone who was born and grew up in the town, it is a privilege for me to have been asked to design the Jubilee Clock Tower which is to commemorate a joyful milestone in our national life.

Peter Ferguson,

Pilton,

Barnstaple.