The Somerset reporter. [volume] (Skowhegan, Me.) 1868-1909, 1895-09-26
HAVE YOU THE TIME 4?
THE ODDS ARE TWENTY TO ONE
THAT YOU HAVE NOT.

ed Daily From Washington
NinetS-nine men out Of a hundred
keep incorrect time. Ninety nine men
out of hundred are just in the act of
regulating their watches i'll front Of
window that has a chronometer in it.
If you ask man the time, and his
watch is wrong, he is invariably going
to the matchmaker that very day to
have it put in order No one has any
idea Of keeping the correct time. All
believe that they have it in their peck
cts, and none ever gets it except at the
moment of setting his watch
If you have a friend III the railroad
business and stop him in the street with
a friendly Hello, old fellow, what's
the time? You always have it correct,
he will haul out his timepiece with an
important air and give the hour in a
voice that shows he knows what time it
is and that he is never wrong. A
square or two farther on you chance to
meet another friend in the same line of
business You ask him the time, receive
an answer, smile to yourself and pass
on. There Was ten minutes difference
between them Every time the state
house bell strikes IA hundred men pull
out their watches with a confident air
of being correct and put them back
with an expression of extreme surprise.
We all live, flourish and die in time,
but no one keeps the correct immediate
record of the moments that beat out
slowly and surely the limit of longevity.
An experienced jeweler and watch
maker, when asked the reason why SO
few people kept good time, said that
nine-tenths of the causes of bad running
watches was due to carelessness and
lrregularity in winding A watch
should be wound at the same time
every day, and it ought to be regulated
on one day every week at the noon
hour, when both hands come together.
rhe finest watches cannot be made per
feet, and the best way to detect any
difference between the two hands is to
reset them at II o'clock, and if they
are not exactly together make them SO
by holding the longer and winding the
hour hand up to it.
An expensive jeweled watch ranging
from $500 to 81 900 is very seldom i'll
good running order simply because the
owner is afraid to let jeweler tamper
with it and does not dare touch it him.
self
In large city correct time, absolutely
correct time. is a matter between some
dozen or two of men who follow almost
every stroke of the pendulum and cor
rect their chronometers with as much
daily regularity as Captain Cutie did his
famous timepiece Women are said to
be the most careless i'll the attention to
Watches A lady has a watch presented to
her by "a gentleman friend and volun
tarily promises to keep it in the very
best running order. The gent leman
friend has his misgivings on that score.
but he gets the jeweler to put it i'll good
shape Il couple of weeks ahead and there
upon hands it over TO the lady. Now,
that watch has been running like a chro-
nomoter until the fair owner gets hold
of it, The first thing she does is to no.
tice the time i'll a store window, and rs
her watch does not agree with it she sets
it accordingly, putting the regulator
away over to one side. That night she
forgets to wind it up, the next morning
she winds it up only half way for fear
of breaking the main spring and sets it
by another clock i'll the afternoon Then
it runs down inside Of eight hours, and
she thinks it is running wild-as it very
likely is, since she has put the regulat
ing lever back and forth no less than six
times in the course of week. After
this she wonders why the watch is al
ways wrong and blames the jeWeler.
Correct time comes into Philadelphia
every day at noon by telegraph from the
United States time observatory at Wash
ington where the drop ball" makes
an electric contact that sends the signal
all over the country. The first clock in
the city communicating with the ObseIv
atory wire is at the Maritime Exchange.
At 56 minutes after | l the hands Of the
clock automatically click into place by
the action of the magnet and the little
train of wheels attached to it. Thus the
Washington time ball becomes at once
the authority for all clocks and an in
fallible adjuster. The statehouse clock
is wound and regulated weekly by an
expert chronometer maker, who sets his
own watch by Washington communicat-
ed time and carries it Immediately to
Independence hall. Many large manu-
facturers and business places where 1t
is necessary on account of the number Of
men employed to have strictly cOnScien.
tious time employ IA man to wind, keep
in order and regulate their clocks the
year round. Clocks kept closely to the
mark in this way are very seldom in
need of extensive repairs, and like intel
ligently regulated watches have less
tendency to 60 wrong
The Washington observatory clock
runs for years together and has never
varied more than six seconds for any
one year
1t is kept true by continual quadrant
observations On the altitude of tho sun
at its meridian. As the earth ; rcvolu-
lions become slower only by the fraction
of a second in thousand years II may
be said that we are unable to take adj
vantage of the natural means afforded
for absolute time regulation III spite
Of the care that has been exercised ID
the making Of timepieces. For 2G, OdO
years, since the first recorded mention
of any instrument TO measure time, IN
Isaiah xXXyiii, 5, men have been at
work constructing apulianceS Of all de