Not just a clock

By Christine Tailer
HCP columnist

It was 1952, decades ago and worlds away, and he was a clockmaker. For several years, he had worked on the docks in New York City. He had been a longshoreman, but then a hoist of iron bars had broken free from their straps and cascaded into the ship's hold. He jumped high and grabbed a hook on the side of the hold. His jump likely saved his life, but his ankle was crushed and he could not work the docks anymore.

He had always loved to tinker, and even as a longshoreman, the fellows with whom he worked, the "boys," would bring him things to fix. He repaired their broken vacuum cleaners, their bicycles, even the cars of those who were fortunate enough to own one, and he repaired their clocks. After his injury, they all gathered round, and even more than before, they brought him their broken things to repair. He was able to earn a living.

He began to branch out, and to design and build his own creations, and yes, he built clocks. They were beautiful. 

He set up the front room of his fourth floor "shotgun" apartment as his shop. The apartment was long and narrow. You could stand by the front room widow and fire a shot out the back. Three rooms sat off of the long hallway; a bedroom at the front, a kitchen, and a bathroom at the rear. The bedroom also served as his living room and shop. He made do, and his clocks sold, simply by word of mouth.

The clocks were like no clocks ever built before. He designed them so that their gears, spring and pendulum could all be seen. He set out the gears so that they curved in a graceful arc across the clear face of the clock. They were not piled one on top of the other, as in typical clock works, but rather arched smoothly from the coiled spring to the escapement driven pendulum. His clocks sold themselves and he kept busy.

The "boys" bought them for their mother's, whose friends saw them and then bought them for themselves. And the friends’ visitors in turn exclaimed at their beauty and purchased them for their own living rooms. In time he built a huge clock, as big as a dining room table, that hung on the wall of a midtown bank. He did well, but his life moved him on, and he eventually went to law school, became a patent attorney, and helped others with their designs and inventions.

I have always loved his clocks. Yes, I am his daughter. I always quietly wished that he would give me one, but he never did. Toward the end of his life, he still had four remaining clocks. Neither his wife, nor his son, nor his daughter, had been worthy of such a gift.

Then he met Greg. They talked of inventions and designs and the beauty of mechanical machines, and one day my father asked if Greg would like his remaining clocks. My father knew that Greg understood their works in a way that most could not, and so Greg brought the clocks home to his own shop.

Greg tweaked the gears, set the pendulums, and three of the four clocks ran. One has been running in our home ever since. Greg winds it every Sunday as he makes his clock rounds. Another sits on the mantle of our son's home. It runs on those rare occasions he remembers to wind it. Yet another we gave to one of Greg's brothers. It has moved with him as his life has moved.

And the last clock? It was my father's "mock up" clock. It was his prototype, his very first, built in 1952. It is rough and does not run for long, but to my eyes, it is so very beautiful.

Whenever I refer to the clock on our bookshelf, I call it my father's clock. Greg smiles. He looks me in the eye, and shakes his head “no.” It is now his clock, but I know in my heart that it is both of their clocks. My father built it and gave it to Greg, and my husband rebuilt it and brought it back to life just as my father knew he would.

Greg has kept the clock running for these past 20 years. By my calculations, Greg has lovingly wound the clock for over 400 weeks. As for me, I have been the lucky lady who basks in the time that my father created and that husband now carefully tends. I am fortunate indeed.

Christine Tailer is an attorney and former city dweller who moved several years ago, with her husband, Greg, to an off-grid farm in south-central Ohio. Visit them on the web at straightcreekvalleyfarm.com.