CLOCKS IN AMERICA
"Say, Mr. McPhearson, I wish you would tell me how clocks got to
America," demanded Christopher when he and the old Scotchman were next
together. "Of course the Pilgrim Fathers couldn't have brought them
all."
The watchmaker chuckled.
"To hear folks boast about their ancestral possessions you would think
the _Mayflower_ might also have brought a few hundred clocks in addition
to all the bales of china, tables, chairs, and beds she is credited with
transporting," replied he. "In point of fact, however, clocks did not
reach these shores by any such romantic method. The early clockmakers
came over here from England and Holland precisely as did other
adventurous craftsmen. Often they were by trade gold or silversmiths who
combined with other arts that of making clocks. As a result, while some
of them were skilled horologers others merely turned out clocks as a
side issue."
"Most likely the people over here were thankful to get any clocks at
all," the boy ventured.
"Evidently there were clockmakers who worked on that theory," was
McPhearson's dry answer. "Do not imagine, however, that I am condemning
wholesale all the early clockmakers. On the contrary there were among
them many really good workmen and every now and then a clock crops up
that testifies to the skill of its dead-and-gone creator. Number
Seventeen, for example, that you saw at Mr. Hawley's, was such a one. It
was made, you remember, by John Bailey of Hanover, Massachusetts, and
ever since the close of the eighteenth century it has ticked faithfully
on, keeping excellent time. What more can you ask of a clock than that?
And that is only one of many. Had we a complete list of all those early
American makers, how interesting it would be! But, alas, they landed and
scattered over the country, settling here and settling there, and with a
few exceptions we can trace them only through town records. Two that
have been successfully tracked down are William Davis, recorded as being
in Boston in 1683; and Everardus Bogardus, who was located in New York
in 1698. Also in 1707 there is mention of a James Patterson arriving
from London and opening a Boston shop. Probably John Bailey, who was no
doubt one of the clockmaking Baileys of Yorkshire, was a pioneer of a
little later period. We can only list these men as we stumble upon their
handiwork. Unfortunately, there are early clocks whose makers it is
impossible to trace. A good many such timepieces were made for the
interiors of churches or for their steeples. The church at Ipswich,
Massachusetts, built in 1699, which at first had only a bell to mark the
hours, arrived five years later at the dignity of a clock having both
face and hands."
"That sounds like the old days in England," exclaimed Christopher.
"It was a turn backward," conceded McPhearson. "For a time our American
clock history repeats in part the history of the race. We did not, to be
sure, revert to water clocks; but our forefathers did not scorn to
resort to sundials, sand glasses, and noon marks. And even after clocks
made their appearance in this country they were at first very sparsely
distributed. Many an amusing incident concerning them is found in the
annals of various towns.
"New Haven as early as 1727 put up a modest little church and in 1740
decided to dignify it with a clock and bell. Accordingly Ebenezer
Parmilee constructed for the parish a clock with brass works which the
committee agreed to _try_. Fancy his amazement when the trial of his
handiwork dragged on for two long years! The people had been keen to get
the clock but having once secured it they were not, I fear, equally keen
about paying for it. History relates that two of the congregation who
had previously pledged themselves to shoulder a portion of the expense
backed out when the final settlement was imminent, on the plea that they
lived too far away either to see the clock or hear it strike."
"They were squealers all right!" derided his listener.
McPhearson turned on him with twinkling eyes.
"Listen to the sequel," continued he. "In 1825 it was decided to have a
second clock put up--one that would do better under the varying weather
conditions--and a bargain was struck with Barzillai Davidson to take
over the old clock, allowing forty dollars for its brass works; and set
up in its place one with wooden works costing about three hundred
dollars. This Mr. Davidson agreed to do. He therefore made the new
clock, put it up, and then departed, carrying with him all the brass
wheels, pivots and things the thrifty Ipswich fathers had discarded.
Imagine if you can the chagrin of these worthies when later they heard
that the canny clockmaker had reassembled the brass works they had
bartered off and converted them into a timepiece which he forthwith sold
in New York for six hundred dollars!"
"That certainly was one on the town fathers," replied the lad, greeting
the story with ringing laughter.
"The saying goes that one has to get up in the morning to beat a Yankee
or a Scotchman at a bargain," was McPhearson's quiet observation. "I
could add to this tale many another one of the early clockmakers. They
were ingenious old fellows. Indeed, they had to be. Some of them, to be
sure, brought tools with them from England; but at best there were only
a few such articles to be purchased even on the other side of the water
where every type of machinery was scarce and still in its infancy.
Therefore the majority of workmen had to fashion their own implements
and make their clocks with only a hammer, file, and drill to help them.
When you consider that, it is little short of a miracle they were able
to produce articles that would keep time with even a reasonable degree
of accuracy. But they contrived to--oh, yes, indeed! Of course they did
not reach their best results immediately. It took a while. Still as
clocks continued to make their appearance the product generally became
better and better. An excellent one, put up in a church steeple in
Newburyport in 1786, was made by Simon Willard, a great Massachusetts
clockmaker of whom I will sometime tell you more. There was also a clock
of Boston make on the Old South Meeting House sometime before 1768; and
Gawen Brown, who made it, also made a long-case clock for the
Massachusetts State House. There were good clockmakers in both New York
and Philadelphia by the year 1750. So, you see, it was quite possible to
buy either a watch or a clock fairly early in our colonial history."
"What type of clock did such makers turn out?" was Christopher's
interrogation.
"For use in the homes the long-case clock was the style favored,"
McPhearson responded. "Some of these had brass works and seconds
pendulums and ran eight days, and others were thirty-hour clocks with
works of wood. Nevertheless, although they were to be had, they were
still something of a luxury and every one did not possess the money to
purchase them; nor, indeed, were they held to be indispensable, many of
the more conservative families preferring still to use the hourglass
even as late as 1812."
"That was the year of the war, wasn't it?" the lad hazarded.
"Yes. The colonists had already had the Revolution on their hands and
national affairs were in such a turmoil it was difficult for any one to
put his mind on building up a trade. But after a while life calmed down
into more tranquil grooves and then clockmaking, like other occupations,
leaped into prosperity. New England, where many of the first clockmakers
had originally settled, led the country in this industry as was natural
she should, more improvements and inventions being perfected there than
anywhere else. And Connecticut was the banner State. She boasted a large
group of successful makers, any one of whom was a master at his craft.
The names of some of them are Daniel Burnap, Thomas Harland, Eli Terry,
Eli Terry, Junior, Silas Hoadley, Seth Thomas, and Chauncey Jerome.
Harland was an expert from London and had a hand in training a goodly
number of American apprentices, among whom the elder Terry was one. The
career of the latter man reads like a fairy tale. In common with other
early workers he labored at the disadvantage of having few tools. He
may, perhaps, have owned a hand engine of the sort used in England at
the period, but until he bethought him of using water power he had
little else to aid him."
"Did he make the long-case clock, too?" asked Christopher.
"Yes. That style of clock, you see, provided space for a lengthy,
slow-swinging pendulum. Nevertheless although it was a popular variety,
it was anything but a convenient one to handle, being both bulky and
awkward to transport. For this reason many such clocks were sold without
cases--a custom borrowed from England--it being understood that buyers
should furnish cases of their own. Only too often, alas, this part of
the contract was never carried out and the unfortunate _wag-on-the-wall_
(as this sort of timepiece was eventually dubbed) was hung up all
unprotected from dust and dampness."
"Do you mean to say they really christened clocks by that unearthly
name?" asked Christopher incredulously.
"_Wag-on-the-wall?_ Yes, indeed. That was the term they went by. Pedlars
carried them round on horseback, riding from house to house and jolting
them over the bad roads until it is a seven-days' wonder they went at
all," was McPhearson's retort.
"I never saw a clock of the sort," the lad mused.
"They are rare now. I suppose most of them were discarded years ago. You
see, since they had no cases they probably became clogged with dirt and
wore out much sooner than did the protected long-case clocks; moreover,
as they were both cheap and commonplace, nobody thought of keeping them
after something better was procurable. Who would dream of laying them
aside and cherishing them because they might in years to come be
curiosities of historic value? Americans never keep anything, you know.
It is a seven-days' wonder how they ever chanced to possess any
heirlooms at all."
Christopher smiled at the Scotchman's savage grumble.
"Thomas Harland made quite a few of these wags-on-the-wall as well as
some fine long-case clocks with works of brass," added the old man.
"I suppose none of the makers could turn out very many clocks when every
part of them had to be made by hand," was Christopher's thoughtful
comment.
"No, they couldn't. Moreover the demand for clocks was not great.
Usually clockmakers either started only three or four or else began none
until they received advance orders. If eight or ten good clocks that
would sell for thirty-five or forty dollars apiece were turned out
inside a year, the output was held to be a pretty fair one."
"Nobody could get very rich on that income," came from the lad.
"Not if that rate of production had continued. But it didn't, you see.
After Eli Terry got to making clocks somewhere about 1795 he was clever
enough to carry water from a near-by brook into his shop and supplement
his tools and hand engine with water power. That was a stride ahead of
the old way and opened before him all manner of undreamed-of
possibilities, as a result of which he decided to make clocks on a
tremendous scale. The type of thing he aimed to produce was a
thirty-hour clock with wooden works and a pendulum vibrating seconds;
and he figured that by purchasing more water power and larger buildings
he would be able to make such clocks at the rate of a thousand or more a
year and therefore turn them out for as little as four dollars apiece--a
mad enterprise in that era of limited economic conditions."
"Did the scheme make good?"
"Not to the extent he had hoped," answered McPhearson. "He could, it is
true, make clocks with wooden works much cheaper than with works of
brass; but he did not feel satisfied with them and after the year was up
he abandoned the venture. Hence this variety of clock of the elder Terry
workmanship is rarely to be found. A somewhat crude timepiece it was,
having no dial and only figures painted on the glass at the front of the
case to indicate the hours. Peering through it one could see the works.
But although Eli Terry himself gave up making this style of clock,
others who had caught his idea did not and consequently a good many of
them came into the market. In fact most of Terry's inspirations were
thanklessly snatched up by his contemporaries, for in all his years of
work he took out only one patent."
A protest escaped Christopher's lips.
"Patents were held in no very high esteem in those days," continued
McPhearson. "People did not regard them in the light we do now. You
remember how the old clockmakers of London blocked the path whenever a
member of their craft attempted to secure one. They wished to share the
benefits of everybody's ideas and therefore maintained that all
inventions should be common property. As a rule those who clamored most
loudly that this altruistic arrangement be promoted were those who never
had any brilliant ideas of their own. As for the inventors
themselves--they were as a rule too intent on the thing they were
producing to pay any great heed to the money end of the project. Eli
Terry was a man of this character. Therefore it came about that when
others copied the circular saw he installed and made off with the other
fruits of his brain he raised no protest."
"Did he never make any more clocks with wooden works?" inquired
Christopher.
"Oh, yes, indeed! By 1814 he had worked out a fresh model of a wooden
clock that he liked much better than his first. This one vibrated
half-seconds and accordingly could be made with a pendulum short enough
for the timepiece to be placed on a shelf as the former one had been. It
was, however, of an entirely new design, having a dial in the upper
half, painted glass in the door and an ornamental pillar at each side of
the case. On top was a decorative scroll of wood and altogether it was a
product so novel and well suited to the home that immediately the public
greeted it with delight."
"And I suppose all the other clockmakers promptly began to copy it,"
interposed Christopher.
"Precisely!" smiled the Scotchman. "The old wag-on-the-wall, and in many
instances even the grandfather clock was consigned to the ash heap, and
the pillar clock became the only clock worth having. It was,
fortunately, within range of the most modest purse, costing only fifteen
dollars. Mr. Terry now had more business than he could handle and he
took in his two sons, Henry and Eli, Junior, to learn the trade and help
him. Of course this wonderful commodity could not be imported because
if taken to sea the dampness would swell its wooden wheels and ruin it.
Nevertheless Terry did not care. He had all the trade he could manage
right here at home. For twenty-five years his wooden clocks remained in
vogue, a long period to hold the favor of the fickle public. Great
credit is due Mr. Terry, too, for bringing such a clock into being, for
a timepiece with wooden works meant the making of an entirely different
set of tools, since it was impossible to use the same implements that
were required in the making of clocks with works of brass."
"I suppose it was a change in fashion that finally caused the downfall
of the wooden-wheeled clock," was Christopher's comment.
He ventured the remark with some pride.
"No, in this particular case it wasn't. Capricious as fashion is, people
liked the shelf clock much better than they did a tall clock that stood
on the floor, and they would no doubt have continued to buy these clocks
with wooden works had not sheet metal began to be manufactured about the
year 1840. Instantly clockmakers saw the advantage of having sheet brass
to work with. It was far better than the cast brass formerly used. An
improvement, too, were the wire pinions--accessories much cheaper and
simpler to produce than were those of wood. Therefore just as wood
forced the old cast brass out of favor, so sheet brass now took the
place of wood. Fortunately for Eli Terry, the drastic changes he had
instituted in the fashioning of his clocks were equally possible of
manufacture either from cast or sheet material."
"No doubt by that time the whole country had gobbled up his inventions,"
sniffed Christopher.
"Yes. The best of his ideas had been seized and generally put into
practice not only on this side of the ocean but also on the other. Two
of his ideas were everywhere popular--the placing of the dial works
between plates; and the mounting of the verge on a small steel pin
inserted in one end of the short arm. But in spite of all the
improvements he had made, Mr. Terry did not sit down with folded hands
and feel there was nothing further to be done. Constantly he was alert
for practical suggestions that should better his handiwork. For example,
he heard that some one was making machinery according to a definite
scale so that parts of it could be exchanged from one article to
another. Why, thought he, should not the parts of a clock be made so
they would be interchangeable? The plan proved a most excellent one and
eventually it was universally adopted by other clockmakers. So you see,
in one way and another, old Eli Terry contributed very materially to
up-building the American clockmaking industry."
"Did his sons go on making clocks?" was Christopher's inquiry.
"Yes," nodded McPhearson. "In fact, ever so many clockmaking Terrys came
after old Eli, and each added his bit to his ancestor's trade. One
branched out and made tempered steel clock springs to take the place of
the expensive springs of brass which were too costly to put into the
cheaper grade of American-made clocks. Oh, yes, the Terrys kept up the
traditions of the family--never fear about that! All that group of early
Connecticut manufacturers did great service to the country in founding
an industry that has brought to the United States a goodly portion of
its business prosperity. Seth Thomas, Silas Hoadley, Chauncey Jerome are
names that will not soon be forgotten; Terryville and Thomaston, two
clockmaking centers, testify to that. As for Jerome--it was he who
experimented with the painting of decorative glass and evolved that
variety having a bronzed effect."
"Oh, I know what you mean," interrupted Christopher with quick
intelligence. "Our kitchen clock has glass like that in the door. And
meantime, while Connecticut was doing so much, what were the other
states up to?"
"Let me think a moment," replied the Scotchman, half closing his eyes.
"Well, Rhode Island never furnished much aid along the line of
clockmaking; her talents seemed to lie in the direction of spinning
yarn, making thread, and weaving textiles. What clocks she needed were
imported or made by hand by local silversmiths. Pennsylvania, however,
contributed her part. David Rittenhouse of Philadelphia was an
exceedingly skillful clockmaker who not only had to his credit many fine
timepieces but also some very complicated and remarkable ones.
Christopher Sower, too, was a Pennsylvania man not to be overlooked."
"Christopher, eh?" the boy repeated.
"Yes. There are some exceedingly distinguished Christophers in history,
remember. You and Columbus are not the only ones," asserted McPhearson,
with dancing eyes. "This Christopher Sower, now, could turn not alone
his hand but his well-trained brain in a variety of worthy directions.
To begin with, before he settled in Germantown he had taken a doctor's
degree in an Old World medical university. Therefore after becoming
established on his American farm he not only tilled the land but he
doctored his neighbors. In addition he took up clockmaking,
paper-making, and the printing of books. And as if these vocations, or
avocations, did not keep him busy enough, he supplemented them by trying
to improve the manufacture of cast-iron stoves. Even he himself,
perhaps, felt it necessary to offer apology for dabbling in so many
trades, for when he came to put his name on his clocks he spelled it
_Souers_."
The lad smiled.
"Then there was also in Pennsylvania a friend of Benjamin Franklin's,
Edward Duffield, who made good clocks. Meantime in New Hampshire both
Timothy Chandler of Concord and Luther Smith of Keene were successfully
plying the clockmaking trade and creating beautiful old clocks. But it
was Massachusetts that was Connecticut's strong second."
"And what was being done there?"
McPhearson put down his drill.
"Were I to begin that story," protested he, "I should have no lunch
to-day and you would have none either. Maybe some other time--"
"To-morrow?" suggested Christopher, who had no intention of allowing
this prince of story-tellers to escape.
"Why, yes--to-morrow--if you are still of the same mind, you shall hear
the Massachusetts story."