Ship Clocks

A ship clock goes back to the days of Christopher Columbus. The ships use to go by a sand glass clock, and at the time it was considered a very important tool for measuring time at sea. Unlike the clocks that we use, the ship clocks ring every half hour to keep track of the shift or watch that the person at the helm is responsible for. The crew would work for four hours and have eight hours off, the shifts always remained the same. Once you knew your shift and remembered the number of times the bell rang between shifts, you never needed a clock.

Then came the early 1900's when the first ship's bell mechanism was designed and patented by a company in Chelsea, Massachusetts. The ship clocks were mostly wall clocks with the exception of the design of a ship mantle clock. The ship clocks were made with brass dials averaging anywhere from four inches to over eight inches in circumference. The dials were done with Arabic Numerals and were12/24 hour, (this was to keep track of the 24 hour shift for the crew on the boat), the dial is protected by flat glass surrounded by a bezel which screws on and off, but they also designed a flat glass cover surrounded by a bezel that just swings open.

They designed the clocks to fit into todays market without taking away the old bell system that was developed when ships first started keeping track of shifts. They kept the same system, (unlike most of the new things that are invented to help us in todays world, that we have to usually relearn, because a company has made something better or easier ) they understood the old saying," if it isn't broke, why fix it". That's why the ship clock has been manufactured for over a hundred years and remains the same.

Visit our other pages devoted to ship clocks Chelsea Ship Clocks