The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-07-13
Story Of Bristo|'s
 Clock Industry How Great Business Started from Small Beginning High School Graduate Gives History of It's Growth Gideon Roberts Made First Timepiece - Town Still Maintains Lead.

Bristol, July 13.-Bristol, as is well known, is the original center of the American clock industry Chaun- cey Jerome, one of the greatest clock | manufacturers that country has pro- duced, who became a very wealthy | man and afterwards fell on evil days, l in his quaint little book entitled American Clock Making gives this town the palm for the early advan ces in the clock making industry. Long before the big plant of the Wa terbury Clock Company, where hum dreds of thousands of Ingersol watch es are turned out every day in the year, or the big factory of the New
 Haven Clock Company was ever heard of, Bristol had a pre- -eminence in. the clock making business that it has always kept and always will. The gentle art of clock making was de- veloped and carried to success in this town. nearly a century ago, and the big factories scattered about the United States to-day are merely side shows of the original industry start ed by old Gideon Roberts on Fall Mountain
 Roberts was the pioneer in the business. He fought through the Revolution and came home from the war to start a great industry in this town among the hills of Hartford County. The historian of the clock industry in Bristol hasn't appeared yet but a good beginning has been of Martin Loughlin the Main street dry goods merchant. The young man was graduated, last month from the Bristol High School as one of the eight that delivered essays on the evening of June 23, he gave as his essay a short concrete'and meritorious history o fthe clock industry in his native town. The work was brief but it has the story in a nutsh ell.
 Many conflicting statements are made regarding the origin of the Am erican Clock indnstry. anu there are several claimanr s- s.fe honor of having made the original clock. However. evidence shows that Gideon Roberts, a resident of Bristol was the first to manufacture them on an ex- tensive scale. To-day the old Rob- erts shop forms the ell to the house of Jason c. Clemence on Fall Noun tain road.
 His first clocks, made about 1870, were at best but crude affairs, and little wonder, for they were made with such simple tools as knife, saw. foot lathe, dividers and hand wood. They had no case and the sides were open. Instead of stand ing, they were bracketed to the wall. The movement was run by weights, and controlled by ball pendulum. 'iMr. Roberts took most of these clocks to Pennsylvania, making the Journey on horseback and carrying only two or three clocks at time. There he came in contact with the Quakers, and soon adopted their dress and teachings. He conduct ed his business with the proverbiaI Quaker thrift, and so steadily did it increase, that he took some of his family into partnership. and the clock industry became sort of mo- nopoly in their hands, where it re- mained for some years.
 'In the early years of the next cen- tury, we find many new men engag- ing in the industry. Among them was Joseph Ives, better known. as Uncle Joe" He was perhaps Bris- clock line, but, like most inventors. he was impractical, and others reap ed the benefit of his inventions.
 Bristol was not without rivals, however, for over in Plymouth Eli Terry invented shelf clock which proved so popular that the outlook for our town was rather dark until Uncle Joe" Ives invented and made metal clock, the first of its kind to be manufactured in America. Bris-
  quantities of clocks were mannfactur- ed, and prospects were still further brightened when a local manufactur- CT invented a long clock which stood upright, the predecessor of the "Grandfather Clock"
 .In 1924 Chauncey Jerome and Eli iah Darrow built a clock shop on the site recently chosen by the govern ment for our new postoffice, and commenced to manufacture one day brass shelf clock, the invention of MT. Jerome. This was undoubt- edly the first spring clock made here. Two years later the firms business having increased 1t built a movement shop on the site now occupied by the American Silver Company.
 ''A few years later a great fire com pletely destroyed these factories and Mr. Jerome moved to New Haven, es- tablishing the New Haven Clock Com pany.
 One of the best7known 5; firms E, of ',d.n the whose factory was on the site at pres | ent occupied by N. L. Birge & Sons Company,
 "In 1888 the Forestville Manufac- turing Company organized. This with several other clock shops of Forestville, came into the possession | of Elisha N. Welch, who thus form l ed the neucleus of the B. N. Welch l Manufacturing Company. In 1903, after a series of financial misfortune | and difficulties, this company was l aboarded by the Sessions Clock Com l pany which is to-day one of the lead l ing industries of Bristol.
 ssTen years after the organization l of the Forestville Manufacturing | Company, Elias Ingraham, 8 cabinet | maker, in company with Deacon l Elisha Brewster, began to make | clock cases, buying the movements l from Noah Pomeroy the predeces- sor of Hiram c. Thompson. In 184S | MT. Brewster withdrew, Andrew In- graham taking his place, and the | firm name became E. & A. Ingraham. In 1881 the firm was again reorgan- ized under it's present name of the | E. Ingraham Company and began to movem ents as we'll as clock cases. To-day it is one of the | largest clock manufacturers in the country with a large export trade,
 Though the early wooden move |
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