Chapter 2 PROGRESS OF CLOCK MAKING.-IMPROVEMENTS BY ELI TERRY AND OTHERS.-SHELF CLOCK.

At the beginning of this book I have said that I would give to the public a history of the AMERICAN CLOCK BUSINESS. I am now the oldest man living that has had much to do with the manufacturing of clocks, and can, I believe, give a more correct account than any other person. This great business has grown almost from nothing during my remembrance. Nearly all of the clocks used in this country are made or have been made in the small State of Connecticut, and a heavy trade in them is carried on in foreign countries.

The business or manufacture of them has become so systematized of late that it has brought the prices exceedingly low, and it has long been the astonishment of the whole world how they could be made so cheap and yet be good. A gentleman called at my factory a few years ago, when I was carrying on the business, who said he lived in London, and had seen my clocks in that city, and declared that he was perfectly astonished at the price of them, and had often remarked that if he ever came to this country he would visit the factory and see for himself. After I had showed him all the different processes it required to complete a clock, he expressed himself in the strongest terms-he told me he had traveled a great deal in Europe, and had taken a great interest in all kinds of manufactures, but had never seen anything equal to this, and did not believe that there was anything made in the known world that made as much show, and at the same time was as cheap and useful as the brass clock which I was then manufacturing.

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The man above all others in his day for the wood clock was Eli Terry. He was born in East Windsor, Conn., in April, 1772, and made a few old fashioned hang-up clocks in his native place before he was twenty-one years of age. He was a young man of great ingenuity and good native talent. He moved to the town of Plymouth, Litchfield county, in 1793, and commenced making a few of the same kind, working alone for several years. About the year 1800, he might have had a boy or one or two young men to help him. They would begin one or two dozen at a time, using no machinery, but cutting the wheels and teeth with a saw and jack-knife. Mr. Terry would make two or three trips a year to the New Country, as it was then called, just across the North River, taking with him three or four clocks, which he would sell for about twenty-five dollars apiece. This was for the movement only. In 1807 he bought an old mill in the southern part of the town, and fitted it up to make his clocks by machinery. About this time a number of men in Waterbury associated themselves together, and made a large contract with him, they furnishing the stock, and he making the movements. With this contract and what he made and sold to other parties, he accumulated quite a little fortune for those times. The first five hundred clocks ever made by machinery in the country were started at one time by Mr. Terry at this old mill in 1808, a larger number than had ever been begun at one time in the world. Previous to this time the wheels and teeth had been cut out by hand; first marked out with square and compasses, and then sawed with a fine saw, a very slow and tedious process. Capt. Riley Blakeslee, of this city, lived with Mr. Terry at that time, and worked on this lot of clocks, cutting the teeth. Talking with Capt. Blakeslee a few days since, he related an incident which happened when he was a boy, sixty years ago, and lived on a farm in Litchfield. One day Mr. Terry came to the house where he lived to sell a clock. The man with whom young Blakeslee lived, left him to plow in the field and went to the house to make a bargain for it, which he did, paying Mr. Terry in salt pork, a part of which he carried home in his saddle-bags where he had carried the clock. He was at that time very poor, but twenty-five years after was worth $200,000, all of which he made in the clock business.

Mr. Terry sold out his business to Seth Thomas and Silas Hoadley, two of his leading workmen, in 1810. This establishment was the leading one for several years, but other ones springing up in the vicinity, the competition became so great that the prices were reduced from ten to five dollars apiece for the bare movement. Daniel Clark, Zenas Cook and Wm. Porter, started clock-making at Waterbury, and carried it on largely for several years, but finally failed and went out of the business.

Col. Wm. Leavenworth, of the same place, was in the business in 1810, but failed, and moved to Albany, N.Y. A man by the name of Mark Leavenworth made clocks for a long time, and in the latter part of his life manufactured the Patent Shelf Clock.

Two brothers, James and Lemuel Harrison, made a few before the year 1800, using no machinery, making their wheels with a saw and knife. Sixty years ago, a man by the name of Gideon Roberts got up a few in the old way: he was an excellent mechanic and made a good article. He would finish three or four at a time and take them to New York State to sell. I have seen him many times, when I was a small boy, pass my father's house on horseback with a clock in each side of his saddle-bags, and a third lashed on behind the saddle with the dials in plain sight. They were then a great curiosity to me. Mr. Roberts had to give up this kind of business; he could not compete with machinery. John Rich of Bristol was in the business; also Levi Lewis, but gave it up in a few years. An Ives family in Bristol were quite conspicuous as clock-makers. They were good mechanics. One of them, Joseph Ives, has done a great deal towards improving the eight day brass clock, which I shall speak about hereafter.

Chauncey Boardman, of Bristol, Riley Whiting, of Winsted, and Asa Hopkins, of Northfield, were all engaged in the manufacture of the old fashioned hang-up clock. Butler Dunbar, an old schoolmate of mine, and father of Col. Edward Dunbar, of Bristol, was engaged with Dr. Titus Merriman in the same business. They all gave up the business after a few years.

Mr. Eli Terry (in the year 1814,) invented a beautiful shelf clock made of wood, which completely revolutionized the whole business. The making of the old fashioned hang-up wood clock, about which I have been speaking, passed out of existence. This patent article Mr. Terry introduced, was called the Pillar Scroll Top Case. The pillars were about twenty-one inches long, three-quarters of an inch at the base, and three-eights at the top-resting on a square base, and the top finished by a handsome cap. It had a large dial eleven inches square, and tablet below the dial seven by eleven inches. This style of clock was liked very much and was made in large quantities, and for several years. Mr. Terry sold a right to manufacture them to Seth Thomas, for one thousand dollars, which was thought to be a great sum. At first, Terry and Thomas made each about six thousand clocks per year, but afterwards increased to ten or twelve thousand. They were sold for fifteen dollars apiece when first manufactured. I think that these two men cleared about one hundred thousand dollars apiece, up to the year 1825. Mr. Thomas had made a good deal of money on the old fashioned style, for he made a good article, and had but little competition, and controlled most of the trade.

In 1818, Joseph Ives invented a metal clock, making the plates of iron and the wheels of brass. The movement was very large, and required a case about five feet long. This style was made for two or three years, but not in large quantities.

In the year 1825, the writer invented a new case, somewhat larger than the Scroll Top, which was called the Bronze Looking-Glass Clock. This was the richest looking and best clock that had ever been made, for the price. They could be got up for one dollar less than the Scroll Top, yet sold for two dollars more.