The Evening post. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1888-1889, 1888-12-20
ONE PUZZLE SOLVED.
why All Painted Clocks Point TO Eigh
teen Minutes After Eight.


From the Ne10 York sun.
An observing man recently sent letter
to this office asking why it was that
every clock and matchmaker who slung
an imitation clock or watch outside his
shop as a sign had the hands painted on
the face at exactly Sis o clock. This
was poser to every clock-seller re.
porter asked. The signs came to them
that way they said. The majority of
them had never noticed the coincidence,
II asked where they got their signs
painted the reply was that they left the
order with their Wholesale dealer and
the sign came along. That was all they
knew about it.
Inquiries among the wholesalers in
Murray street and Maiden Lane devel-
oped the curious fact that there is no
competition in the trade of painting clock
signs. This state of affairs is brought
about by the wholesale clock and watch
dealers themselves, who got used to pat
roni2ing three dealers many years ago,
and never got enough out of the habit to
give any other painter the ghost of a
show TO succeed with an opposition shop.
but Father Washburn," said one
.
and of emblematic signs as well. He
was the first painter to make q sign en-
blematic of any business, and he started
in way back in SO. Why, the big con
Germs that make metal signs don't bother
him at all. He gave his ideas to the
| whole world to copy and the world got
rich. The friends he made back in the
! SOS have stuck to him ever since, and
! Of ha N
| close that no competitor in Other
branches of sign work ever thinks OF
getting a clock or watch sign to make
and, if by chance he did, he'd probably
be so scared he'd send the customer tc
Father Washburn."
MIR. Washburn was painting clock OF
big star when the reporter called. lie
was an old man with happy face and ,
white beard There were clock sign
mapped out, half done, and finished
hanging all around, and every blessed
one of them had the hands pointed a
S:1S o'clock.
"The reason all the dummy -clocl
hands point to that hour" said Mr.
Washburn, lis because paint them all
and 1 always paint that hour. When
painted the first emblematical sign eve
painted as n matter of business, back il
SO, it was a clock. | don't know hov
| put the hands. All remember abou
it is that it was for p. T. Barnum's oil
concern on Cortlandt street, the Jerom
Clock company, since gone up the spout
II painted the hands any way chose
up, down, crosswise. or together, as m
mood dictated, from that time up t
April IA. 1865. That night the news wa
flashed into the city that Lincoln hat
been shot in Ford's Theatre. l wa
working on sign for Jeweler Adams
who used to keep on Broadway, opposit
Stewards, at the time. l was making
great clock to hang outside. Adam
came running in while / was at work
He was a strong Lincoln man. He said
Point those hands at the hour Lir
coin was shot that the deed may neve
be forgotten
II painted the hands, therefore, O
: S;lS. The idea struck me forcibly. an
when l came to look at the effect foun
it was the most convenient arrangement
since it displayed both the hands we
and left the top half OF the clock free
paint in the name of the clock-seller
, desired So | threw all my stencils ava
and made new ones for that hour.
have never varied from the system sine,
and that's the reason all the clock sign
point as they do. The Chicago and Cil
cinnati people / find are doing the sam
, thing. They don't know the story, br
they probably were won to my plan |
the capability of that particular arrang
, ment for artistic display in painting"