The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-04-01
FARM HAND AND SCIENTIST.
Remarkable Rise of the o'clock
maker of Manistee."


From the Chicago Times Herald.
Nels Johnson, the "clockmaker of Man
istee" has scored a new triumph. He has
constructed a six-inch telescope and built
an observatory. Peasant and mechanic,
with no school training, and forced to
earn his livelihood by his daily labor, this
simple Dane has arisen to be a member
of several scientific associations and the
compeer of learned men. For a living
he makes great clocks to mark the flight
of time, and for diversion he studies the
heavens to learn the secrets of time and
eternity BY turns farmland, blacksmith,
machinist, cloakmaker and astronomer,
this humble, isolated worker has won the
respect of men OF science and earned
membership in the American Association
for the Advancement of Science, the AS
Economical Society of the Pacific and the
Astronomical Society Of Michigan.
The story of Nels Johnson is the story
of an earnest, inquiring spirit achieving
eminence in spite of tremendous handi-
caps. He was born in 1888 on the Dan
ish Island of Seland, of peasant parent
age, and he learned in infancy that his
life mission was to work. He began to
work on the farm az the age of 7 years,
dilu ne has Dce1 at IL even SliNNt Dht bh"A
has not prevented him from thinking. He
started for the New World with $12 in his
pocket When he landed at Quebec he
was $40 in debt. He pushed westward
and began his career as a blacksmith at
Milwaukee at 81 a day. He could not
speak English, but he had Drawn and
could work the bellows or pound the red
hot bars lying on the anvil
Within him was the impulse to move
on to something better and he soon turn
ed to clockmaking. As a blacksmith's APP
prentice he had made an electro-magnet
to operate a pendulum. He drew the wire
from a block of silver and wound it by
hand with cotton thread. He constructed
clock while machinist at Milwaukee,
but it was not a success. lie profited by
the failure. and in Manistee he started
again, without education other than that
gained in the shop; about all the mental
equipment he had was a machine shop
kind of arithmetic.
So Nels Johnson, machinist and foun
dryman, turned astronomer to become
clock maker. He had never been to school
day in his life and he soon found it was
no child's play-this being an astronomer.
He took up arithmetic, dug into 1t with
determination and moved on into trigo-
nometry. lie got hold of a nautical alma
nae and a copy of Clark's transit tables.
III the course of time their meaning slow
ly dawned upon him and he learned to
know the consultations. In the meantime
he had saved enough money to buy a fine
set of transit instruments and It was a
proud moment when he was able to say
no knew how to use them. lie was able
to make clocks that would not vary more
than four seconds a month and many
public buildings in the West are adorned
with the dials of the clockmaker of Man
istee.
But he discovered he was not vet an
astronomer and that spurred him on to
new efforts He bought a small telescope
and several astronomical books. Then he
got into the habit of dropping his clock
| making to run over to Ann Arbor to re-
vel in the observatory of the State Uni
versity and ask questions. He studied and
experimental and observed and asked
questions to such good purpose that able
astronomers accepted him as a compan-
ion spirit. He has constructed all of his
big telescopes except the lenses and says
1t was but "the serious pastime of idle
moments"