A 250-pound weight which powers the Gorham town clock, fell 10 feet Friday night, jarring the First Parish Church tower and shaking the man who was standing outside on the steeple as part of a food drive.
“It shook the whole tower,” said Eric Smith, an assistant pastor at First Parish Church who stood a 24-hour vigil on a narrow ledge 65 feet above the church vestibule where donors took food and money to aid Gorham’s needy.
Rev. David Butler, who was in the tower during the mishap, said a cable snapped at about 6 p.m. on Friday, causing the weight to cascade down a shaft inside the church tower. The town’s clock man was resetting the village’s historic clock when the incident occurred.
An 18-inch-square beam supporting the shaft withstood the blow of the falling weight and stopped it from dropping all the way down. “The steeple is overbuilt,” Smith said, commenting on the construction.
There were no injuries and the church tower was only slightly harmed. “It did a little damage but not much,” Butler said.
A box of rocks, which travels in a shaft inside the church tower, powers the clock. Town Councilor Phil Dugas, who once wound the clock weekly, said the weight box was filled with stone, regulating the clock. If the clock ran slow, more weight would be added. And, if it ran fast, some of the weight would be removed.
Clock expert Rick Balzer of Balzer Family Clock Works in Freeport said the clock was designed to operate with about 125 pounds of weight. But, he thought with wear during the passing of time more weight would have been added. The box likely weighed 250 pounds, Balzer said.
Gorham owns the clock, which was a gift to the town from Toppan Robie about 1860. It cost $500 brand new. The clock hasn’t kept accurate time recently and a town committee was named last summer to review restoring the clock.
The church was hoping the clock would tick steadily during the vigil. “We’re going to try to keep it on time,” Smith said when he took a stand on the ledge at noon on Friday.
Eric Smith checks the clockworks before taking his stand on the ledge at noon on Friday. Six hours later the church tower shook when a weight that powers the clock fell.Send questions/comments to the editors.
