With a clock on its hands that could have a value of up to $1 million, Gorham is facing a debate on where to put it once repairs are complete.
Now in pieces at a Freeport clock works shop, it had been ticking away for 138 years in the steeple at the First Parish Church, until a mechanism snapped last winter. The Gorham Town Council set aside $75,000 to repair the clock after it broke.
Yet to be determined, however, is where the clock will be installed once it is repaired this spring. Arguing that town tax money is being used to repair it, one town councilor has called for a referendum on where to put the clock. However, members of the church feel the clock has always been there and should remain there.
Toppan Robie, a leading Gorham church and political figure in the 1800s, gave the clock to the town in 1868. Generations in Gorham have looked up to its four faces to tell time.
The clock was powered by a box of stones that gradually traveled by gravity down a shaft after being cranked up. But last winter, a mechanism snapped and the box plummeted downward, rocking the church steeple when it slammed into a wooden beam.
The town commissioned Balzer Family Clock Works of Freeport to restore it. “They are world recognized,” said Burleigh Loveitt, vice chairman of the town council and chairman of the town’s clock committee.
Robie paid $500 for the clock, which was manufactured by the Howard Clock Co. in Boston. Putting its value in perspective, a replica constructed by repair company owner Rick Balzer, who has built tower clocks for the world-renown Neiman Marcus department store and the University of Arkansas, would cost $100,000.
After talking with Balzer and considering the clock’s historical significance in Gorham, Loveitt said the clock could be worth up to $1 million.
Linda Balzer, wife of Rick Balzer, said the estimate isn’t unrealistic. “It’s an irreplaceable timepiece for the town of Gorham,” she said.
Like a Rolex
For 10 years, Phil Dugas, who is now a town councilor, climbed the church’s steeple stairs once a week to wind the clock with a hand crank. Dugas, then a church sexton, was once paid $250 a year by the town to wind the clock. The clock was never electrified. Dugas regulated the accuracy of the clock by adding or removing rocks to the weight box.
Balzer said Howard made 5,000 clocks, and Portland’s City Hall clock, which Balzer is also restoring, is No. 2,971. Gorham’s is No. 44.
Balzer said the Gorham clock has a dead-beat escapement mechanism invented by George Graham, a British clockmaker, who died in 1751. He said Gorham’s clock works by the same principle as modern-day watches. “Gorham’s clock works the same way a Rolex watch works,” Balzer said.
Balzer removed the clock from the First Parish steeple on Sept. 30. Now the clock has been dismantled at Balzer’s, one of four major projects in a shop filled with clocks of every description. “Gorham’s is in a bazillion pieces,” Rick Balzer said.
He’s spending four to five hours per gear cleaning each of the clock’s many brass, steel and cast iron gears. Displaying a brass gear, he pointed out many of the gears had grease and grime hardened on by time. “It was meant to have oil in specific places only,” he said.
Some of the clock’s worn gears will require replacements that Balzer will fabricate himself. “There’s a couple of pinion (small gears) that are shot,” he said. “They were a real mess.”
Balzer made a new pawl, a catch that prevented the clock from unwinding. It’s the device that snapped, allowing the weight to crash.
When he first viewed Gorham’s clock in September last year, Balzer found a piece of steel, probably from a dump truck spring, in the street outside the church. He took it home, not knowing it would come in handy later as the steel he needed to replace the pawl.
With the clock in his shop, Balzer discovered a silver plate attached to the pendulum rod. It is inscribed: “Presented to citizens of this town by Hon. Toppan Robie 1868.” In the dark steeple interior, the plate probably hadn’t been seen for years. Even Dugas and Loveitt haven’t seen the plate.
Balzer said the plate should be attached to the base that holds the clock’s works. He removed another silver plate from that base that read: “Repaired by M.L. Royal. July 30, 1938.”
Clock location debated
Now, with such a valuable piece of history on its hands, town officials need to weigh where the clock will wind up. Loveitt said the clock would be ready to be returned to Gorham in March or April. Church leadership has suggested encasing the clock’s works in the church vestibule, where it could be viewed by the town’s people. The church owns the four faces of the clock, which are part of the steeple, but the clock hands belong to the town.
Balzer could run a shaft up through the church to the steeple from the vestibule to turn the hands. He indicated a shaft would be inexpensive.
But Loveitt said possible locations for the clock are being studied. “We are exploring what options are available and at what costs,” Loveitt said.
Balzer said a constant temperature would benefit accuracy. He said a temperature change affects the 106-inch long pendulum, which swings at the rate of 1.5 seconds per tick. He said a knob regulates the time by adjusting the length of the pendulum.
The clock should be accurate to 30 seconds a month, depending on where they put it, Balzer said.
Former Town Councilor Matt Robinson believes it should be located on town property now that taxpayer money is restoring the clock. He said only $31,000 is being spent on restoration. He said the rest of the money allocated for the work could be used to mount the clock at the municipal center, with the clock’s face toward South Street.
“I don’t think it’s right to put it in the church,” Robinson said.
Robinson, who once attended First Parish, objects based on the principle of the separation of church and state. He said four town councilors or their families are connected to the church, and five members of the church are on the clock committee. Robinson favored a referendum, allowing the citizens of Gorham to decide.
Mark Faunce, moderator of the First Parish executive council, said the church “feels strongly” that the restored clock be in the church. Faunce said the church’s intent is to locate the clock’s works in the church vestibule. People could view the clock during business hours, he said.
Faunce said the church would contribute to the cost of installing it in the vestibule. “Our desire is to have the restored clock returned to the church,” Faunce said.
Loveitt, a member of the church, said it needed to be recognized that there are town councilors with associations to the church, but he is satisfied that the council would act in the best interests of the town. “This council is taking its public trust very seriously,” Loveitt said.
Loveitt said the process would be public and a hearing would be held in January or February to receive input. He said the final decision would be made in a public meeting.
Loveitt in August halted the start of restoration after a rumor spread that the church could claim ownership of the clock. But the church signed a waiver, relinquishing any claim of ownership.
Robinson said returning the clock to the church would also raise insurance questions.
Town Manager David Cole said insurance coverage of the clock by the town had “slipped through the cracks” in recent history. He said the clock is insured now, but he declined to reveal the amount. “We added it a month ago,” Cole said about coverage.
If it’s installed other than in the steeple of the church, it would need a new face, as well as a base to accommodate the pendulum. The box of rocks would be replaced by cast iron weights that would travel in a track made of steel. The weekly chore of winding of the clock could also be eliminated by automation, if the town chooses.
Balzer will train someone to maintain and set the clock once a month. He’ll provide the town with a maintenance manual and a log record book.
The clock works weigh about 700 pounds. It had some graffiti scratched on it over the years and was repainted years ago.
Restoration will renew the clock’s beauty along with mechanical parts. “It will look like it did when it came out of the Howard factory,” Balzer said.
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