WOODEN CLOCKS | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jan 13, 1887

WOODEN CLOCKS.

A wooden clock is a good deal of a curiosity, in this part of the world, but in Europe, where the enterprise of the Yankee clock and watch-maker has yet failed to penetrate, the wooden clock is the general rule among the middle and lower classes. The simplest forms of time-pieces of this construction are very cheap, and as they combine with this the advantage of being fairly accurate time-keepers, their popularity is not to be wondered at.

It is perhaps not generally known that these wooden clocks are the product of an industry that is carried on almost exclusively in the Black Forest in Germany, and in a recent report to the State Department, Consul Ballow of Kehl gives a very interesting account of the history of this curious, and one might almost say primitive, industry. The inhabitants of this wild and otherwise unproductive region apparently had no other resource but to engage in some such employment, and in this respect the wooden clock industry is a species of natural production, in which all the phases of the process of evolution are illustrated. They did not have the soil to work upon, but they had plenty of wood, and the natural ingenuity of the people was not long in turning it to account.

The first wooden clocks were made in the seventeenth century and were of the most primitive construction. Even in the middle of the last century the mechanism was of the simplest form and consisted of three wooden wheels and an escapement resembling a yoke, which was operated by leaden weights. The pendulum was introduced still later, but it was not until thirty years ago that any changes were made in the old traditional forms. Many of these old clocks were very complicated in their mechanism, at least so far as the attachments were concerned, and in addition to recording the time of day they would mark the day of the week, month, and year, the principal feast days, and operate whole armies of soldiers and other automatic figures.

The clock-makers of the Black Forest during the early part of the present century had gained such a reputation for their product that they controlled the market on the Continent, and made a great deal of money. Then new styles came into fashion, and for a long time the industry in the Black Forest languished because the manufacturers refused to give up the old form. Since 1850, however, they have conformed to the more modern usages, and now all varieties of clocks are made, from the very finest regulators with metallic works down to the plainest of the old wooden forms, for there are still many who adhere to the old traditions.—Graphic.