SUCCESS OF THE NEW INVENTION.--INTRODUCTION OF CLOCKS IN ENGLAND.--TERRY
FAMILY, ETC.
We went on very prosperously making the new clock, and it was admired
by every body. In the year 1839, some of my neighbors and a few of my
leading workmen had a great desire to get into the same kind of
business. We knew competition amongst Yankees was almost sure to kill
business and proposed to have them come in with us and have a share of
the profits. An arrangement to this effect was made and we went on in
this way until the fall of 1840. I found they were much annoyance and
bother to me, and so bought them all out, but had to give them one
hundred per cent. for the use of their money. Some of them had not paid
in anything, but I had to pay them the same profits I did the rest, to
get rid of them. One man had put in three thousand dollars for which I
paid him six thousand. I also bought out my brother Noble Jerome, who
had been in company with me for a long time, and carried on the whole
business alone, which seemed to be rapidly improving.
I made in 1841, thirty-five thousand dollars clear profits. Men would
come and deposit money with me before their orders were finished. This
successful state of things set all of the wood clock makers half crazy,
and they went into it one after another as fast as they could, and of
course run down the price very fast--"Yankee-like." I had been thinking
for two or three years of introducing my clocks into England, and had
availed myself of every opportunity to get posted on that subject; when
I met Englishmen in New York and other places, I would try to find out
by them what the prospects would be for selling Yankee clocks in their
country. I ascertained that there were no cheap metal clocks used or
known there, the only cheap timepiece they had was a Dutch hang-up wood
clock.
In 1842, I determined to make the venture of sending a consignment of
brass clocks to Old England. I made a bargain with Epaphroditus Peck, a
very talented young man of Bristol, a son of Hon. Tracy Peck, to take
them out, and sent my son--Chauncey Jerome, Jr. with him. All of the
first cargo consisted of the O.G. one day brass clocks. As soon as it
was known by the neighboring clock-makers, they laughed at me, and
ridiculed the idea of sending clocks to England where labor was so
cheap. They said that they never would interfere with Jerome in that
visionary project, but no sooner had I got them well introduced, after
spending thousands of dollars to effect it, than they had all forgotten
what they said about my folly, and one after another sent over the same
goods to compete with me and run down the price. As I have said before,
wood clocks could never have been exported to Europe from this country,
for many reasons. They would have been laughed at, and looked upon with
suspicion as coming from the wooden nutmeg country, and classed as the
same. They could not endure a long voyage across the water without
swelling the parts and rendering them useless as time-keepers;
experience had taught us this, as many wood clocks on a passage to the
southern market, had been rendered unfit for use for this very reason.
Metal clocks can be sent any where without injury. Millions have been
sent to Europe, Asia, South America, Australia, Palestine, and in fact,
to every part of the world; and millions of dollars brought into this
country by this means, and I think it not unfair to claim the honor of
inventing and introducing this low-price time-piece which has given
employment to so many of our countrymen, and has also, been so useful to
the world at large. No family is so poor but that they can have a
time-piece which is both useful and ornamental. They can be found in
every civilized portion of the globe. Meeting a sea captain one day, he
told me that on landing at the lonely island of St. Helena, the first
thing that he noticed on entering a house, was my name on the face of a
brass clock. Many years ago a missionary (Mr. Ruggles,) at the Sandwich
Islands, told me that he had one of my clocks in his house, the first
one that had ever been on the islands. Travelers have mentioned seeing
them in the city of Jerusalem, in many parts of Egypt, and in fact,
every where, which accounts could not but be interesting and gratifying
to me.
It was a long and tedious undertaking to introduce my first cargo in
England. Mr. Peck and my son wrote me a great many times the first year,
that they never could be sold there, the prejudice against American
manufactures was so great that they would not buy them. Although very
much discouraged, I kept writing them to 'stick to it.' They were once
turned out of a store in London and threatened if they offered their
"Yankee clocks" again to the English people "who made clocks for the
world;" "they were good for nothing or they could not be offered so
cheap." They were finally introduced in this way; the young men
persuaded a merchant to take two into his store for sale. He reluctantly
gave his consent, saying he did not believe they would run at all; they
set the two running and left the price of them. On calling the next day
to see how they were getting along, and what the London merchant thought
of them, they were surprised to find them both gone. On asking what had
become of them, they were told that two men came in and liked their
looks and bought them. The merchant said he did not think any one would
ever buy them, but told them they might bring in four more; "I will see"
he says, "if I can sell any _more_ of your Yankee clocks." They
carried them in and calling the next day, found them all gone. The
merchant then told them to bring in a dozen. These went off in a short
time, and not long after, this same merchant bought two hundred at once,
and other merchants began to think they could make some money on these
Yankee clocks and the business began to improve very rapidly. There are
always men enough who are ready to enter into a business after it is
started and looks favorable. A pleasing incident occurred soon after we
first started. The Revenue laws of England are (or were, at that time)
that the owner of property passing through the Custom-house shall put
such a price on his goods as he pleases, knowing that the government
officers have a right to take the property by adding ten per cent. to
the invoiced price.
I had always told my young men over there to put a fair price on the
clocks, which they did; but the officers thought they put them
altogether too low, so they made up their minds that they would take a
lot, and seized one ship-load, thinking we would put the prices of the
next cargo at higher rates. They paid the cash for this cargo, which
made a good sale for us. A few days after, another invoice arrived which
our folks entered at the same prices as before; but they were again
taken by the officers paying us cash and ten per cent. in addition,
which was very satisfactory to us. On the arrival of the third lot, they
began to think they had better let the Yankees sell their own goods and
passed them through unmolested, and came to the conclusion that we could
make clocks much better and cheaper than their own people. Their
performance has been considered a first-rate joke to say the least.
There will, in all probability, be millions of clocks sold in that
country, and we are the people who will furnish all Europe with all
their common cheap ones as time lasts.
All of the spring and eight day clocks have grown out of the one day
weight clock. There can now be as good an eight day clock bought for
three or four dollars, as could be had for eighteen or twenty dollars
before I got up the one day clock. Mr. Peck, who went to England with my
son, died in London on the 20th, September, 1857; my son died in this
country in July, 1853: so they have gone the way of all the earth, and I
shall have to follow them soon. They were instrumental in laying the
foundation of a large and prosperous business which is now being
successfully carried on. The duties on clocks to England have been
recently removed, which will result to the advantage of persons now in
the business. The many difficulties which we had to battle and contend
with are all overcome. When I invented this one day brass clock, I for
the first time put on the zinc dial which is now universally used, and
is a great improvement on the wood dial, both in appearance and in cost.
This simple idea has been of immense value to all clock-makers.
In the year 1821, when I moved to Bristol, no one was making clocks in
that town; the business had all passed away from there and was carried
on in Plymouth. The little shop I had put up had no machinery in it at
that time. I soon began to make so many cases that I wanted some better
way to get my veneers than to saw them by hand. I found a small building
on a stream some distance from my shop which I secured, with the
privilege of putting a circular saw in the upper part, but which I could
not use till night--the power being wanted for the other machinery
during the day. I have worked there a great many nights till twelve
o'clock and even two in the morning, sawing veneers for my men to use
the next day. I sawed my hand nearly off one night when alone at this
old mill, and was so faint by the loss of blood that I could hardly
reach home. I always worked hard myself and managed in the most
economical manner possible. In 1825, we built a small factory on the
stream below the shop where I sawed my veneers two or three years
before, but there was no road to it or bridge across the stream. I had
crossed it for years on a pole, running the risk many times when the
water was high, of being drowned, but it seems I was not to die in that
way, but to live to help others and make a slave of myself for them. In
1826, we petitioned the town to lay out a road by our factory and build
a bridge, which was seriously objected to. We finally told them that if
they would lay out the road, we would build the bridge and pay for one
half of the land for the road, which, after a great deal of trouble, was
agreed to, and proved to be of great benefit to the town. Our business
was growing very rapidly and a number of houses were built up along the
new road and about our factory. I should here mention that Mr. Eli
Terry, Jr., when I had got the Bronze Looking-Glass Clock well a going,
moved from Plymouth Hollow two miles east of Plymouth Centre, (now the
village of Terryville,) where he built another factory and went into
business. His father retiring about this time, he took all of his old
customers. He was a good business man and made money very fast. He was
taken sick and died when about forty years old, leaving an estate of
about $75,000. His brother, Silas B. Terry, is now living, a Christian
gentleman, as well as a scientific clock-maker, but he has not succeeded
so well as his brother in making money. Henry Terry of Plymouth, who is
another son of Mr. Eli Terry, was engaged in the clock business thirty
years ago, but left it for the woolen business. I think that he is sorry
that he did not continue making clocks. He is a man of great
intelligence and understands the principles of a right tariff as well as
any man in Connecticut. His father was a great man, a natural
philosopher, and almost an Eli Whitney in mechanical ingenuity. If he
had turned his mind towards a military profession, he would have made
another General Scott, or towards politics, another Jefferson; or, if he
had not happened to have gone to the town of Plymouth, I do not believe
there would ever have been a clock made there. He was the great
originator of wood clock-making by machinery in Connecticut. I like to
see every man have his due. Thomas and many others who have made their
fortunes out of his ingenuity, were very willing to talk against him,
for they must, of course, act out human nature. Seth Thomas was in many
respects a first-rate man. He never made any improvements in
manufacturing; his great success was in money making. He always minded
his own business, was very industrious, persevering, honest, his word
was as good as his note, and he always determined to make a good article
and please his customers. He had several sons who are said to be smart
business men.
I knew Mrs. Thomas well when I was a boy, fourteen years old. She is one
of the best of women, and is now the widow of one of the richest men in
the state. The families of Terry and Thomas are extensively known,
throughout the United States. Mr. Thomas died two years ago at the age
of seventy-five. He was born in West Haven, about four miles from New
Haven, and learned the joiners' trade in Wolcott, and worked in that
region and in Plymouth five or six years, building houses and barns. I
waited on him when he built a barn in Plymouth, carrying boards and
shingles. He soon after went into the clock business in which he
remained during life. Mr. Terry died in 1853, at the advanced age of
eighty-one.