Clocks · Clock
19th C. American Ripple Front Shelf Clock, c. 1860
- Maker / attribution
- Unrecorded in source
- Date
- c. 1860
- Historical period
- Industrial Revolution (1850 – 1900)
- Country of origin
- United States
- Object type
- Clock
- Materials / technique
- brass, glass, metal, rosewood
- Auction house
- LiveAuctioneers auction archive
- Lot
- Item 64645934
- Credit line
- Auction lot record: lot 5111, Classical Gas - Online Discovery Auction, Thomaston Place Auction Galleries (2018), via LiveAuctioneers
- Catalogue title (original)
- 19TH C. AMERICAN RIPPLE FRONT SHELF CLOCK (English)
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Record summary
Catalogued by LiveAuctioneers auction archive (lot Item 64645934), this is a clock, made in United States, dated c. 1860. The Atlas places it in the Industrial Revolution period (1850 – 1900) of its Clocks collection. Materials and techniques recorded by the source: brass, glass, metal, rosewood. The record is illustrated with 4 photographs.
Assembled from the source record's structured fields. Dates and attributions are given as the source states them; where a field is missing the Atlas leaves it blank rather than estimating.
Catalogue description
Lot description — Thomaston Place Auction Galleries
Circa 1860 Rosewood Cathedral Form Clock with applied ripple molding to front, painted metal dial with Roman numerals, transfer 'etched' lower glass, brass 8-day time and strike movement, original paper label from E. N. Welch of Forestville, Conn. Retaining the original brass pendulum bob. 19" x 10 1/2" x 4". Very good condition, some loss to etching on lower glass. Per Antique Clocks Guy: "The E. N. Welch Manufacturing Company was a joint stock corporation formed July 6, 1864 to succeed an older private firm making clocks under the name of E. N. Welch. Elisha N. Welch (1809-1887) had been making clocks at a factory site on East Main Street at Forestville, Conn. since taking over the bankrupt business of J. C. Brown about 1856."
Historical context
Industrial Revolution (1850 – 1900)
American interchangeable-parts manufacture; railroad time standards; Swiss and German factory systems.
Factory production transformed the clock into an everyday object. American makers (Seth Thomas, Ansonia, Waterbury) and German factories (Junghans, Gustav Becker, Lenzkirch) sold millions of shelf, wall and alarm clocks worldwide; France produced standardised Paris movements and carriage clocks; electric time distribution began.
Read the period in the timelineMore clocks from this periodEarlier: Precision & Scientific Horology
Atlas type guide
Bracket, table and spring-driven clocks
Spring-driven clocks freed timekeeping from the hanging weight. The coiled mainspring, documented from the fifteenth century, made portable table clocks possible; to even out its declining force, makers used the fusee, a conical pulley connected to the barrel by a gut line or chain. Renaissance table clocks from Augsburg and Nuremberg — drum-shaped, square or tower-shaped in gilt brass — were luxury scientific objects, often with astronomical dials and alarms.
After the pendulum, English makers developed the bracket clock: a wooden case with a carrying handle, a short pendulum with a verge escapement, and often repeating work to sound the hours on demand at night. Later examples use the anchor escapement. In the nineteenth century, 'table clock' became a broad term for spring clocks of every nationality.
What to look for
- A fusee in the movement (cone-shaped pulley) and the type of line — gut or chain.
- Verge escapement with a short bob pendulum, often with a decoratively engraved backplate.
- Repeat cords or buttons that make the clock strike again on demand.
- Gilt-brass engraved cases and horizontal dials on Renaissance pieces.
- Case shapes: inverted bell, bell top, break-arch, lancet or balloon.
Dating clues
- Drum and tower table clocks: c. 1520–1650.
- Ebony veneered English bracket clocks with verge escapements: c. 1670–1800.
- Engraved backplates were usual on English clocks until c. 1800, then generally plain.
General guidance written by the Atlas editors about this kind of object. It is not a statement about this particular piece; for that, rely on the source record above and on physical examination.
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