A time for clocks

Press, 12 July 1980, Page 15

A time for clocks

CHRISTINA DAVIS, a member of the journalism course at the University of Canterbury, writes of a Frenchman, PIERRE JOLIDON, who looks after Christchurch’s public clocks. Mr Jolidon is shown polishing the mechanism of the Silver Jubilee clock in Victoria Street.

Many years ago, a Warnin' lawyer wrote to the Christchurch City Council demanding reim : burseraent for his taxi fare to Sumner. He had missed his tram home, he said, because the Post Office clock was nine minutes slow. . .

On another occasion a ratepayer asked, scathingly, whether the same, clock had joined a trade union and “gone on strike.”

Today,-this latter criticism seems unfair. After a century of keeping time, the clock is running better than it has ever done. The benefits of modern technology are only partly responsible for this. Credit must also go to the M.E.D.’s clock specialist, a Frenchman, Pierre Jolidon. Gone are the days when wiremen spent part of ever,' day working on the clock. It now forms part of a weekly round by Pierre Joldon, during which he checks at least seven clocks against the time signal from an Australian radio station. Batteries are checked, faces are greased, and every six months each clock is thoroughly cleaned and oiled.

Mr" Jblidon came to New Zealand 20 years ago from Geneva, where he had lived for slightly longer and where he learned the trade among watchmakers.

' But what has the M.E.D. got to do with clocks? Most of the public clocks in Christchurch are electrically operated. In many cases, new electric clocks have been reset in old surroundings. The jubilee clock proper, for instance, is only 40 years old, though the

iron superstructure in which it is set is well into its second century. The Post Office clock has, in a sense, been electric from the beginning. At the time of its construction in 1879, “The Press” described it as having all the latest improvements. Prime among these was the “electric wire” which was to connect it to the time-ball tower at Lyttelton. Later, . when electric power came to Christchurch. the old weight and pendulum system was removed and an electric motor was installed to wind up the weights. Finally, in 1955, an electric master clock was installed to control “slave

clocks” on the four faces of the tower. The clock is still an holologist’s nightmare. Bicycle chains and other improvised bits and pieces hold it together. But Mr Jolidon copes. “Most of the work is done as required, or when some public spirited per-

son realises that the clock is out of time,” he says. This all means a considerable degree of accuracy. . . . rarely should an clock lose time. And it is in the interests of accuracy that, twice a year, Pierre Jolidon spends the night hours “on the town.” From midnight until 5 a.m. he scales ladders and towers resetting the clocks for daylight saving. His path takes him from Brighton . to Sumner and includes not only the Post Office clock, but the Edmonds .Clock, the floral clock, the M.E.D.’s own clock, and the Silver Jubilee clock in Victoria Street. The Jubilee clock has

probably seen, more of Christchurch than any other. Originally intended to grace the Provincial Government Buildings in Gloucester Street, it arrived on the Lyttelton wharves at the end. of 1860, stowed in 147 separate packages. Three years after the dissolution of the Provincial Government, the tower was handed over to the Christchurch City Council — only to be neg--lected for the next 18 years in the city council’s yard on the site occupied today by the Captain Scott statue.

Then, in 1897, it was brought out of mothballs by members of the Citizen’s Clock Tower Committee which had banded together to re-erect the clock for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee. It proved to be something of a large-scale jig-saw puzzle. The parts had originally been numbered, but a subsequent coating of red paint made it difficult to find what was what.

It remained on its site at the intersection of Manchester, Lichfield, ar.d High Streets until 1930, when it was decided the clock was obstructing traffic. In October, the tower was transferred to its present site in Victoria Street. Around this period, too,

the clock came under fire for its poor time-keeping. It was said the clock had to be adjusted every time it was wound and was so inaccurate that a visitor to New Zealand missed his boat through relying on it — a contrast to the days, in 1897, when the clock was remodelled into a “first-rate time piece” and inspected by no less an expert than the Westminster Abbey organist

The decision was made to replace the clock proper with an electric clock and at the same time to placate sensitive residents by removing the chimes. It was not until 1978, after the council had assessed feeling for the chimes by sending . out questionnaires to local residents, that the new “Westminster” chimes were installed. One clock which never chimes is the Time and Temperature clock on top of the Government Life building. Instead, 591 100watt lamps light up the minutes for miles around.

The clock is, in fact, checked against Greenwich Mean Time signals every month and the variation — barring blown fuses, broken contacts, short circuits, and earthquakes is usually no more than a few seconds either way.

Between summer and winter various adjustments may have to be made. Temperature changes cause contraction and expansion of .the meta! in the pendulum, affecting the clock’s accuracy.

Private clocks are not quite so reliable. Without the Pierre JolidOns of this world they seem to run wild — though, fortunately, the tendency is to get a traveller to his destination early rather than iate. On a trip around the city one day I found four clocks which were running at least a few minutes fast. But only one was drastically out — the floral clock opposite the town, hall.

This was the first floral clock to be installed in New Zealand and one of the earliest in the world. When I passed it at 11 in the morning it was half an hour slow. Five hours later it had lost another 10 minutes. Mr Jolidon assured me that he was not directly responsible for the clock. Perhaps, the greenfly had got to it . a a