Two New Clocks: Novelties for London Court

Two New Clocks: Novelties for London Court

arcade, Big Ben, Big Clock, clock, dragon, Fremantle, H. Hope Jones, Hay Street, horse, knights, La Grosse Horage, lance, London Court, mechanisation, Monk of Glastonbury, Moreton Bay, Peter Lightfoot, retail arcade, Rouen, shopping, St George, St George’s Terrace, sword, Synchronome Company Ltd, synchronome invention, “Tournament of Tilting Knights”, WA, Wells Cathedral, Western Australia

In this article from The West Australian in 1937, the arrival of two clocks destined for London Court in Perth, Western Australia is announced. They were delivered to Fremantle by Mr H. Hope-Jones, managing director and founder of the Synchronome Company in London, during his world tour of observatory clocks. The article goes on to summarise Hope-Jones’ description of the clocks: the clock at the St George’s Terrace entrance would have a dial copied from the famous medieval (fourteenth century) Big Clock at Rouen and the clock at the Hay Street entrance would be a replica of Big Ben in London. Above the clock at the St George’s end, Hope-Jones explained, would be the figures of St George and the dragon on a revolving horizontal wheel. The wheel would revolve once at every quarter past the hour, twice at every half hour, three times at every three-quarters past the hour and at the chiming of the full hour St George’s sword would touch a hidden trigger switch and the dragon’s head would fall off. Above the Hay Street clock would be four jousting knights, who would occasionally dismount each other with a blow from their lance. This, Hope-Jones said, was a copy of the fourteenth-century Wells Cathedral Clock reputed to have been made by Peter Lightfoot, the Monk of Glastonbury.

Anon.

National Library of Australia

The West Australian

9 October 1937, p. 27.

The West Australian

Digitised Newspaper Article

Digitised Newspaper Article - National Library of Australia

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article41438038