I'm glad you enjoyed what I wrote about my grandparents and their shop—thanks for letting me know!
Not only did Grandpa S. manage to have this whole other business after being gassed; he and Grandma S. also started their family afterwards. My Dad, the eldest, was born in 1922.
Re the stories in Romance and History of Time, it's been ages since I read them, so I can't give you much of a review. I think I probably first learned about water clocks from that booklet, but that's all I really recall from previous readings.
However, flipping through it, now, I notice a certain modern arrogance (and racism and sexism) in some of the color illustrations, and a certain sentimentality in both illustrations and text. The modern arrogance is not unalloyed, however. Here's a brief quote from Chapter VIII:
"Human nature knows little change, and a manhunt in the dawn of the Sixteenth Century knew no difference from the blood-lust of our Twentieth Century mob."
In that chapter, the mob is hunting a skilled young locksmith who was a suspect in a fatal tavern fight. He finds sanctuary from the mob in a monastery, and the abbot challenges him to invent the first clock that is small enough to be carried about for daily use. The story says the effort took him two years, but he did it. The name attributed to the locksmith in the story is the same name that comes up when I do a web search for "who invented the first watch?": Peter Henlein of Nuremberg. Here's a photo of a watch that he probably made, from 1505: Pomander Watch
Volume 1 ends with a story cliffhanger, and the following message:
The conclusion of this Absorbing Romance and History of Time has been published as Volume two of the series.
Your copy is in the hands of your jeweler, who will be glad to deliver it to you upon the presentation of your request card. This request card will be mailed to you direct from our offices immediately upon receipt of the request application turned under the introductory sheet on the inside front cover.
Elgin National Watch Co., 86 East Randolph Street, Chicago, Illinois
E.g., early data-mining! My copy is missing the request application. There's no way, now, to know if one of my family members sent in the application, or if it was lost (or never inserted into this copy of the booklet). Elgin was a U.S. company from about 1864 to 1968 or 1970, depending on how you count it. After that, the rights to the name were sold (and re-sold). Looks like "Elgin" watches are now sold in places like Walmart.
Re: clock museum post
Not only did Grandpa S. manage to have this whole other business after being gassed; he and Grandma S. also started their family afterwards. My Dad, the eldest, was born in 1922.
Re the stories in Romance and History of Time, it's been ages since I read them, so I can't give you much of a review. I think I probably first learned about water clocks from that booklet, but that's all I really recall from previous readings.
However, flipping through it, now, I notice a certain modern arrogance (and racism and sexism) in some of the color illustrations, and a certain sentimentality in both illustrations and text. The modern arrogance is not unalloyed, however. Here's a brief quote from Chapter VIII:In that chapter, the mob is hunting a skilled young locksmith who was a suspect in a fatal tavern fight. He finds sanctuary from the mob in a monastery, and the abbot challenges him to invent the first clock that is small enough to be carried about for daily use. The story says the effort took him two years, but he did it. The name attributed to the locksmith in the story is the same name that comes up when I do a web search for "who invented the first watch?": Peter Henlein of Nuremberg. Here's a photo of a watch that he probably made, from 1505: Pomander Watch
Volume 1 ends with a story cliffhanger, and the following message:E.g., early data-mining! My copy is missing the request application. There's no way, now, to know if one of my family members sent in the application, or if it was lost (or never inserted into this copy of the booklet). Elgin was a U.S. company from about 1864 to 1968 or 1970, depending on how you count it. After that, the rights to the name were sold (and re-sold). Looks like "Elgin" watches are now sold in places like Walmart.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯