Description:
Gravity clock made of mahogany by Benjamin Franklin Willard (1803-1847), the fifth son of Simon Willard (1753-1848). If a clock was desired to keep accurate time and sent the message of status, the reputation of the Willard family for fine, eight-day timepieces drew patrons from throughout northeastern United States. The eldest brother, Benjamin Willard (1743-1803), was the first of three generations of Willard clock and watch makers who started working in Grafton, Massachusetts, in 1766; when the clockmaker Nathaniel Mulliken Sr. of Lexington, Massachusetts, died in 1767, Benjamin moved there and took over his business, while his younger brothers, Aaron (1757-1844) and Simon, stayed behind in Grafton continuing to make clocks and watch repairs. Simon also experimented with new forms that reduced the size of clock movements, and in 1801, introduced a wall clock with a patented design (patented 1802) with its Patent Timepiece movement, later known as a "banjo" clock. Benjamin Willard set up shop in Roxbury in 1771, followed by Simon and Aaron whose names first appear on the tax roles in 1783, each working in a separate location. Their sons and a grandson continued the profession: Simon's sons, Simon Jr. (1795-1881) opened his own business in Boston in 1828 specializing in manufacturing chronometers and Benjamin worked with his brother, and Simon Jr.'s son, Zabdiel Adams (1826-after 1911) continued making pocket chronometers; Aaron's sons, Aaron Jr. (1783-1864) took over the business in 1823, which Aaron Sr. had moved to Boston about 1792, and Henry (1802-1887) specialized in making clock cases. Benjamin Franklin Willard was considered a natural mechanic, inventor, and superb workman; he patented an improved lighthouse mechanism in 1839, and between 1842 and 1844, made a spring-powered skeleton clock (inscribed "Rich & Willard, Boson") with an exposed mechanism, which was considered a rarity and marvel in its time. Benjamin was awarded a gold medal by the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Association in 1844. The case has a central brass urn over a scrolled top and flanking brass side arms; the round dial has roman numerals and gilt brass hands. The clock case functions as its own weight and rides up and down a notched steel rod in alot in the back. The dial and mechanism (rack lever escapement) are mounted inside the brass cylinder. The clock is probably missing its backboard, which may have supported the brass finial now mounted on the clock. In John Ware Willard's "A History of Simon Willard," this clock is noted as owned by Edwin K. Johnson of Ashby, Massachusetts.
Label Text:
George Alfred Cluett (1873-1955), of Troy, New York, and Williamstown, Massachusetts, collected American furniture from around 1901, shortly after he and Edith Tucker were married, through the mid-1920s. Cluett was prominent among early collectors. For the first museum exhibition of American furniture, The Hudson-Fulton Exhibition, opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1909, Cluett loaned 22 objects. Cluett, whose family business became Arrow Shirts, finished collecting before Henry Francis DuPont began to amass objects for what became the core of the Winterthur Museum in Delaware. The Cluett family donated most of its collection to Historic Deerfield beginning in 1960, with its last gifts given in 2003. Cluett’s keen connoisseurship, focused on Classical objects (contemporary to his grandparents’ lives) is notable as he collected before the publication of the first seminal reference books on American antiques. Moreover, the early twentieth-century collectors focused on the so-called Pilgrim Century, which predates the Classical era by over one hundred years. Cluett was particularly intrigued by the work of craftsmen including Seymour, McIntire, Phyfe, and Lannuier. Cluett’s desire for privacy, and reverence for times past has long obscured his creative connoisseurship and legacy as one of the earliest and influential collectors of American furniture.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+85.008 |
