Early American Clockmakers: Seth Thomas

Video Transcript

The story of Seth Thomas really begins back in this era, too, of Eli Terry. He's probably a name that almost everybody has heard of when they're talking about clocks and clock collecting. He...he was a contemporary of Eli Terry, but he was...he was...the guy who probably even made more money. You often hear about the guy who thinks up the idea, the inventor, doesn't do as well as the second guy who runs with the invention. And Seth Thomas was probably in that category. He was actually a wood worker, so he began making the pillar and scroll clock, and some of the later clocks as well, based on...on those designs. He actually had an agreement with Eli Terry, where under license, since the pillar and scroll clock was patented, under license he was able to make the...the pillar and scroll clocks as well. So he had many years early on, when he was involved with wooden works clock making, mass producing these early clocks, and didn't become the true giant of...of Connecticut clock making until later on. But he was an important early name as well. He...uh...it was actually a law suit, which we're not sure whether he instigated it or Terry did, or whether they did it just to try to clear out some of the other competitors, but he began making pillar and scroll clocks without the license, without the credit to Eli Terry. And you see clocks with those kinds of labels in them as well. And it was settled in a way that maybe, for a while, discouraged some of the people that were trying to make clocks like Terry without paying him any...any license fees for doing so.

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