The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-05-24
HUGE FLORAL CLOCK
 FOR THE WORLDS FAIR

With its mechanical frame quite con cealed beneath beautiful flowers and vari- colored foliage plants. the mammoth fio- ral clock that may be seen at St. Louis by visitors to the Louisiana Purchase ex- position in 1904 will be by far the larg est timepiece ever constructed, says the Boston Herald.
 The floral clock is immediately north of the Agriculture building, and to the visitor appears to be made entirely of contributions from the floral world. The mechanism of the clock is buried. and the huge dial, 100 feet in diameter. shows Tits face six inches above the ground. The dial, the hands. the minute hand being fifty feet long and moving five feet at a move. and all of the frames are so cover ed with fwers as to quite conceal any mechonical contrivance.
 The numerals marking the hour are lffteen feet nlength and are made of bright colored coleus, a foliage plant that grows dense and may be pruned with the gard eners's shears and kept symmetrical with out fear of impairing the growth of the plant.
 In a circle surrounded the numerals are collection of twelve distinct plants each collection being twenty-five feet long and twelve feet wide. Nature has ordained that each of these plants should open its blossom at certain hour of the day. and the great floral clock shows how the laws of nature are as exact as the mechanical laws discovered by man. AS the hands of the giant floral clock reach the num- eral naming a certain hour the flowers in 
 designated begin to open their buds and exhale the perfume peculiar to the plant.
 Still another mode of computing time will be shown by this immense recorder of times fight and this by the primitive hour-glass On the south side of the dial, behind the numeral that denotes midday or midnight. is built a tower twelve feet square and eighteen feet high. The tower is of wood and. like most of the beauti- ful structures within the City of Knowl- edge, is covered with stan. The archi- lecture Is graceful and ornate. The top of the tower Is surmounted with man. moth hour-glass. made of the heaviest and dearest crystal. with the receptacles for holding the sand, each six feet in lengh and four feet in diameter. at the base. The hour glass is so suspended that when the sand is spent the glass auto matically reverses itself and another hour is being tolled off.
 Concealed in the towers is the pictur- esque massive machinery, weighing tons and controlling the powerful steel shaft that extends under the center of the flor al dial more than fifty feet distant.
 Above the hour glass is suspended a sweet-toned bell. weighing 5000 punds. on which the hours are announced. The the extreme ends of the grounds.
 With the first sound of the bell, the massive and beautifully decorated doors to the tour swing open and the machinery that propels the great timepiece is ex- posed to the view of the public. In one minute the doors are again closed, and the Vine-cOVered nandS continue lnelf JOur- ney.
 The entire center of the face of the mammoth floral clock. a space inside the circle created by the numerals and seven ty feet in diameter. is composed of al ternanthere a foliage plant which is com monly known os "Joseph's coat" because of its many colors. This plant grows low and exceedingly dense, and the mottled and brightly eolored foliage completely covers the ground. but will never grow tall enough to be touched by the hands as they pursue their course.
 Encirciing this immense bed of alter nanthere and separating it from the fif- teen-foot floral numerals that mark the hour is narrow band of centaurea, another foliage plant, popularly known as the Dusty Miller" This species of plant a beautiful silver in appearance, grows trihe higher than the alteFnanthere. The band of Dusty Miller, only eight inches wide, separates the seventy-foot circular bed of antehnantherO from the twelve-foot beds of the same plant that surround the space on the dial allotted to the large numerals.
 The hands of the clock are made of framework of steel. but wooden troughs filled with soil are provided, and in these troughs myrtle. ivy and other creeping green plants grow luxuriantly and com+