A Wagon-Spring Clock
date: label: Date made
content: ca 1845
name: label: maker
content: Birge & Fuller
notes: label: Description
content: From its invention in the fifteenth century, the coiled steel spring became the preferred power source of European clockmakers. The spring permitted clocks to be small and portable, so most small European clocks and watches employed it. But the steel spring was an expensive import to America. Until the middle of the nineteenth century, and the introduction of the Bessemer process for mass-producing steel however, coiled steel springs were not produced in the United States. American clockmakers circumvented this limitation with ingenious weight-driven shelf clocks that were accurate, reliable, and compact. These they mass-produced and offered to ever-widening markets.
label: Description
content: Joseph Ives, a Bristol clockmaker notable for his inventiveness but lack of business success, had first introduced wagon-spring clocks in the 1820s. They had conventional weight-driven brass movements, except for one feature: The strings that ordinarily would have held the weights were connected, through intermediary pulleys, to the free ends of what looked like a wagon-spring on the bottom of the case. This mechanism exerted a downward pull like the two weights.
label: Description
content: When American clockmakers began to compete abroad with European clockmakers in the 1830s and 1840s, they were reminded of the advantages of spring-driven clocks. They vigorously explored various schemes for producing spring-driven clock movements without relying on imported steel springs. When one manufacturer in Bristol, Connecticut—Brewster and Ingraham—had considerable success with coiled springs made of brass, a local competitor, Birge and Fuller, resurrected Ives's "wagon-spring" design.
label: Description
content: Birge and Fuller manufactured wagon-spring clocks from 1844 until 1847, when locally produced coiled-steel springs finally became available.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Connecticut, Bristol
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Mechanisms
label: See more items in
content: Domestic Furnishings
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Mrs. Francis B. Allen
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: ME.315876
label: catalog number
content: 315876
label: accession number
content: 225120
objectType: label: Object Name
content: clock
label: Other Terms
content: clock; Wagon-Spring; Shelf Clock
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: wood (case material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 26 in x 13 3/4 in x 4 in; 66.04 cm x 34.925 cm x 10.16 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: 26 in x 13 3/4 in x 4 1/4 in; 66.04 cm x 34.925 cm x 10.795 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: container: 4 3/4 in x 3 in x 3/8 in; 12.065 cm x 7.62 cm x .9525 cm