The Old Bordenian Association

1965 to 2008 – A Story of a Clock

When I inherited the Physics Laboratory in 1964 there were no stop clocks. Any that did exist prior to that had been borrowed from other labs when the need arose. This was far from perfect, especially as I could not control their care, so I muddled by for the first year cadging the odd clock when necessary. This worked reasonably well for the sixth form practicals, but my policy with the ‘O’ level sets was to have no more than three pupils in a group for practical.

The Games department had stop watches that were used for sport, but they were in short supply and more often than not were needed at the same time as I needed them. So with an average of 25 in a set, at least 8 clocks were required plus a spare in case of a malfunction. The alternative was to rely on the slave clock on the wall at the back of the lab which advanced its large hand by half a minute every 30 seconds – not the most accurate of ways to time the swinging of a pendulum for example. In those days one or two pupils had a wrist watch with a sweep second hand that could be used, but you could never rely on there being enough in one set and understandably boys were loath to lend them to others.

Hence in March 1965 when I was able to produce my first requisition for equipment I purchased the first large clock with a sweep second hand. It was made by Junghans and was a mechanical device with just a start/stop lever and a reset button. I could only afford one of these so it was placed on the front bench in view of the class and left running. In the pendulum experiment to measure the acceleration due to gravity (‘g’), 50 oscillations needed to be measured. Depending on the length of the pendulum, this meant that a time of between 70 and 112 seconds was required to within an accuracy of 1%. Using two people, one to call when the pendulum passed the vertical and the other to note the time from the clock, it was possible to get close enough to this accuracy for a reasonable result to be obtained. Remember that this clock had a sweep second hand that clicked forward every second so the results yielded were surprisingly good from those who took things seriously.

My next acquisition was a large electric clock hung on the back wall under the slave clock. This had a mains motor that enabled the second hand to move continuously giving the opportunity to estimate at least half seconds. By this time I had bought 4 stop watches, like those in the games department, for use at ‘A’ level so that times accurate to 0.1 seconds could be measured.

Meanwhile the old original clock continued in use for timing longer periods where a stop facility was not needed as in the measurement of temperature of objects at half minute intervals to produce cooling curves. It came in handy too on the sports field for timing the longer running events (440 yards upwards) especially when large numbers of entrants were trying to achieve standards for House points. In was on one of these occasions, after school on a pleasant summer afternoon that Tony Clayton and I were lounging on the bank overlooking the track on the lower field. We were keeping an eye on a dozen or so sixth formers going for their standard in the one mile (6 laps in 5minutes 30 seconds I think). Tony leaned back and put his elbow through the glass face of the clock. Neither suffered any injury and the clock continued its steady progress. And the clock continues working to this day. Its use has decreased with the passage of time as over the years more stop watches were purchased.

The new electronic age meant that mechanical watches were replaced by digital ones with liquid crystal displays. They were more robust and cheaper – you could even get one free from a garage when you spent more than a certain amount on petrol. The disadvantage of a mechanical watch failing was that it had to be sent away for repair. I did not have to send the digital watches away since when one failed we just threw it away if the insertion of a new battery failed to do the trick. The old clock still has its uses but it is used less frequently, probably preserving its useful working life. At present it gets used just once a year at the Annual Old Bordenian Association Dinner. Traditionally the clock is used to measure the length of the speeches to decide the winner of the sweepstake. On the morning of the Dinner I awake the clock from its slumber and put it through its paces for an hour or so to ensure it is up to the task. Then it’s over to Mike Pack, the timekeeper, to take it into his care for the duration of the meal. After that I return it to its cupboard in the Archive Room to rest for another year. After 43 years I can report that our timepiece is still going strong and has never failed or needed to go away for repair. I gave it a time check last year and it was just a few seconds slow against my digital watch after a couple of hours. How many of us will it outlive I wonder?