Wooden wheel clock

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Early cuckoo clock, Black Forest, around 1760–1780 (German Clock Museum, inv. 03-2002)
Miniature balance clock "Engadiner Zytli", 74 mm high, number ring diameter 37 mm, made of boxwood and plum wood by Paul Gerber
Davos wooden wheel clock from 1717 with alarm disc

A wooden wheel clock is a wheel clock whose movement is largely made of wood. Of the large wooden clocks , the Black Forest clocks are the best known.

history

Wooden wheel clocks were manufactured in numerous regions of Central Europe from the 17th to 19th centuries. The oldest surviving objects date from around 1580. Poor farming families with craftsmanship from cooperage or turnery and traditional watchmaking knowledge began manufacturing wooden wheel clocks as a sideline in the long winter months.

In addition to the usual wall clocks for farmers' and craftsmen's rooms, the wooden clockmakers created art clocks with astronomical displays, movable figure games and musical works. Pocket watches made of wood are rare.

Black Forest clocks

Franz Anton Ketterer (1676–1750), a poor farmer from Schönwald , and Simon Dilger (1671–1750), a wood turner from Schollach , began to manufacture wooden wheel clocks with a scales (Foliot) as a regulator. The balance clock is a wooden wheel clock that has only one pointer ( one-hand clock ).

From 1640, balance beam clocks were manufactured in home work in some Black Forest valleys. It took about a week to make a watch. On the four markings on the wooden dial, only the quarter hours could be indicated with the pointer (quarter hour clock). For the time, the clock was a sensation, despite the lack of minutes.

The Black Forest cuckoo clock was created around 1750 , in which a cuckoo was integrated into the Scottish clock with a cow tail pendulum that peeked out of the door in the upper arch of the shield.

The importance of watchmaking grew so strongly that the Grand Ducal Baden Watchmaking School (today: German Watch Museum ) was founded in Furtwangen in 1850 . Its first director, who later built the Black Forest Railway and the northern ramp of the Gotthard Railway , was Robert Gerwig .

Davos wooden wheel clocks - Ura Tavo (Rätorom. For Davos clock)

From 1668 to 1839 an independent branch of Swiss wooden wheel watchmaking developed in the Davos area . After the turmoil in the Graubünden brought great hardship during the Thirty Years' War , the Peace of Westphalia came a time of modest prosperity. However, only a few rich citizens could afford their own iron room clocks. Less affluent citizens felt the need for an affordable, custom-made watch of their own.

In the back yard of the Sertig Valley , with its long winter months, the Ambühl family from Walser began to manufacture wooden wheel clocks. Watchmaking expertise handed down in the family, learned abroad, good local materials as well as great craftsmanship from the white cooperage formed the prerequisites. An iron clock from that time served as a model. The ornaments of the first known Davos wooden wheel clock from 1696 resemble the Chur iron clock by Martin Rager . The same construction with the imprecise wheel balance was retained during the 170-year manufacturing period. Larch wood was used for the pillars, Swiss stone pine for the rest of the frame and mountain birch for the wheels . The slim hour hand is carved with a three-pronged tip and a crescent moon at the opposite end and sits directly on the alarm clock disc. In the older clocks, the hour and quarter hour indicators are separate. The chunky, short quarter-hour hand was also used to readjust the clock.

The Davos clocks were distributed and sold regionally on the mule tracks of the Wolfgang , Flüela , Scaletta and Strelapass to Prättigau , Upper Engadin and Schanfigg . The Black Forest clocks industrially manufactured from 1820 onwards, which were imported via the Graubünden pass roads built in the 19th century, put an end to the production of Davos wooden wheel clocks.

literature

  • Berthold Schaaf: wooden wheel clocks . Callwey Verlag, Munich 1986, ISBN 3-7667-0791-4
  • Klaus Hess: The Davos wooden wheel clock - Ura Tavo . Clock collection Kellenberger , Winterthur (ed.) German / French, approx. 40 pages.
  • Werner Gehrig: Of old and new wooden wheel clocks. Josef Holenstein, a passionate watchmaker. In: Toggenburger Annalen, 1989, pp. 101-106.

Museums

Exhibitions

  • The Davos wooden wheel clock - Ura Tavo. Special exhibition of the Kellenberger watch collection, Winterthur , from September 19 to February 20, 2011.

Web links

Commons : Wooden Wheel Clocks  - Collection of Images, Videos, and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ GH Baillie: Watchmakers & Clockmakers of the World. Third Edition, NAG Press Ltd., London 1966.