Ansonia Clock Co

Ansonia Clock Co

Ansonia was named for Anson C. Phelps who caused the Ansonia Brass Co. (part of the Phelps Dodge Co.) to be built here. Rolled brass became commercially available in quantity in the United States sometime during the early 1830’s. After 1838 it had generally replaced cast brass and wood for making clock movements. Since clocks provided a market for brass, what could have been more natural for Phelps to do than to start a clock company in connection with the brass operations to use more of his own product. In 1851 The Ansonia Clock Company came into existence as a subsidiary company. It is probable from the clocks and data now available, that even from the very start two firm names were used. Ansonia Clock Co. was one, and Ansonia Brass & Clock Co. was the other; both marked "Ansonia, Conn." It seems they used aggressive sales promotion methods, working on the premise that the more clocks made and sold, the more brass they would use. A store or outlet in Boston is mentioned in the city’s 1854 Directory with the Ansonia Clock Co. name at 43 Hanover Street "nearly opposite Portland St — Manufacturers and Dealers in Cocks and Timepieces of every style and variety!" That last part covers many different clocks if we keep in mind the quantity of differing cases being turned out in Connecticut alone due to the freeing of the designs from the fall of weights as springs became the motive power.

Ansonia clocks proved to be good and saleable. The business prospered until about 1859 when the volume of business justified the separation of the clock and brass companies. In the very tough financial year of 1873, the clock company was incorporated. 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Ansonia Clock Co 

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury (nicknamed the "Brass City") is a city in New Haven Country Connecticut on the Naugatuk River, 33 miles (53 km) southwest of Hartford and 77 miles (124 km) northeast of New York City. As of 2010 Census Bureau estimates, the city had a total population of 110,366 and is the ninth largest city in New England, the fifth-largest city in Connecticut and the second largest city in New Haven County

Throughout the first half of the 20th century Waterbury had large industrial interests and was the leading center in the United States for the manufacture of brassware (including castings and finishings), as reflected in the nickname the "Brass City" and the city's motto Quid Aere Perennius? ("What Is More Lasting Than Brass?"), which echoes the Latin of Horaces ode 3.30. It was noted for the manufacture of watches and clocks

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Waterbury Clock

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

 The Ansonia Clock Company was one of the major 19th century American clock manufacturers. It produced millions of clocks in the period between 1850, its year of incorporation, and 1929, the year the company went into receivership and sold its remaining assets to Soviet Russia.

       Here is a brief timeline describing the events leading to the formation of the Ansonia Clock Company and to its ultimate demise.
1844 - The Ansonia Brass Company is formed by Anson Green Phelps
       Although he became one of the great mercantile capitalists of his time, Anson G. Phelps had rather humble beginnings. Born to an old Connecticut family, he was orphaned at age ten, and soon after became a saddlemaker’s apprentice. He later moved to Hartford and went into business for himself as a merchant and a shrewd trader. He bartered saddles for cotton from South Carolina and then sold the cotton in New York. With the proceeds from the cotton sales he purchased dry goods to sell back in his Hartford store.
       At age 31 he moved to New York and joined forces with another Connecticut trader, Elisha Peck. As the firm of Phelps & Peck they exported Sourthern cotton to England and imported metals to New York in return, becoming New Yorks largest metal importer of the time.

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

Ansonia Clock Company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

When I think about a clock made by the New England Clock Company, the first things that come to mind is their flowery dials and beautiful cases. The case work on these clocks is of a fine furniture quality. The New England Clock Company made the cases and the movements in their Connecticut plants at first. Later, they began purchasing the movements abroad, mostly from Germany. They also began having other manufacturers make cases, dials, hands, weights and other parts to their specifications, and the parts were assembled into complete clocks at their plant in Farmington.

Even though the N.E.Clock Co. wasn't started until 1956, their roots go back much further. Let's take a minute to review the origins of this company. The company actually started as the Forestville Manufacturing Co., in Forestville, Conn. This was around 1835. When Forestville Manufacturing went bankrupt around 1860, Elisa Nils Welsh, absorbed the company. It was renamed the E. N. Welsh manufacturing company, in 1864.

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

New England Clock company

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Justin J. Miller was born and raised in San Diego California, as a young entrepreneur he focused on implementing new marketing strategies to the paid television industry and continues to work in this field.

Justin was introduced to Black Forest horology at an early age, and has been enthusiastically involved in the field for more than two decades. Early on in his collecting career, his collection and research turned almost exclusively to Black Forest clocks that are today considered rare or unusual. He publishes, lectures, and coordinates exhibitions showcasing the Black Forest's finest offerings.

Justin also operates BlackForestClocks.org, the leading informational English-language website on the subject. He has recently completed a comprehensive book titled, Rare and Unusual Black Forest Clocks, which will be released by Schiffer Publishing in the spring of 2012.

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

 

Black Forest Clocks

Black Forest Clocks

 

Telechron

Telechron

Hammond decided to go into the electric clock field in 1927 after he had worked on developing synchronous motors for another project.  After studying what Warren Telechron was doing, he thought their clock motors were complicated and expensive to manufacture.  He thought he could make a lot of money competing against them.

Hammond's approach to power loss was different than Telechron's, which was patented in any case.  The Hammond clocks were "spin to start," and this was intentional.  Otherwise, if the clock restarted itself, you wouldn't necessarily know there had been an outage.

Hammond's motors used a flywheel and ran at a different speed than Telechron's.

 

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

Telechron

 

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Bells cast from metal were first developed in the Bronze Age, achieving a particularly high level of sophistication in China. During the European Middle Ages, they were used by Christians to signal divine services and make special announcements. Christian and Buddhist monasteries historically used them to regulate daily activity, conceptually similar to later timekeeping in the U.S. Navy. The Catholics consider bells a representation of the voice of God and of paradise.

One of the earliest recorded mentions of the shipboard bell was on the British ship Grace Dieu about 1485. Some ten years later an inventory of the English ship Regent reveals that this ship carried two "wache bells".

Timekeeping:

Before the advent of the chronometer time at sea was measured by the trickle of sand through a half - hour glass. One of the ship's boys had the duty of watching the glass and turning it when the sand had run out. When he turned the glass, he struck the bell as a signal that he had performed this vital function. From this ringing of the bell as the glass was turned evolved the tradition of striking the bell once at the end of the first half hour of a four hour watch, twice after the first hour, etc., until eight bells marked the end of the four hour watch. The process was repeated for the succeeding watches. This age-old practice of sounding the bell on the hour and half hour has its place in the nuclear and missile oriented United States Navy at the dawn of the Twenty-First Century, regulating daily routine, just as it did on our historic vessels under sail in the late Eighteenth Century.

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells

Navy Bells