Living, Breathing
I think I have mentioned this before. The ticking of the tall case clock in the Mitchell House, its ringing on the hour, always makes me feel like the Mitchell House is alive. It is when I have to stop the clock for the winter that the House goes dormant. It’s a sound that I become quite use to when it is running – the ticking and ringing. It always makes me chuckle to myself when the Mitchell House intern first starts work in late May. It takes them a few weeks to discern the difference between the clock and the front door bell but then, they get it. (Don’t worry – I don’t let them “run” for the door – I tell them, “No! It’s the clock. You’ll get used to the difference.)
The tall case was a wedding gift from William Mitchell’s parents to William and Lydia on their wedding day. Made in Boston by John Deverell in 1789, it’s a year older than the House. William and Lydia gave the clock to Phebe Mitchell Kendall upon her marriage in 1854. Phebe left t to her only child, William Mitchell Kendall who then left it to the Mitchell House in his estate in 1941. I am not sure how William’s parents came to the clock – perhaps it was their clock as William and Lydia married in 1812 so by then the tall case (no, not called a grandfather clock!) was twenty-three years old.
On its face it rotates the phases of the Moon and shows the seconds and the date. It’s a seven-day clock, but I wind it twice per week (always, holding my breath as it is 231 years old!) It has wonderful inlays around the bonnet top and the case where the door to the pendulum and weights are located. And its face is enameled. It’s a simple – very appropriate for a Quaker family – tall case clock with just a touch of “extras” – a bit of color and a bit of decoration.
I put it to bed a few weeks ago – I wait pretty far into the fall as I hate to stop it. But when I do, I tell it to have a good winter and that I will see it when I wake it in the spring.
JNLF
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