As we are near the end of the first four years of the Westclox Museum, I am thinking more and more about the amazing history of what was once “The Largest Clock Factory in the World”. Yes, it was the largest, and it started with a building 100 ft. by 40 ft., three stories high. Every other part of the factory grew as an attachment to the original building – eventually approximately 20 acres of floor space with close to 5,000 employees.
For more than five years we have been researching the history of the company, the people, and the building, always finding surprises and secrets to preserve forever. We want to share this history with everyone, which we do with every visitor to the museum. We always have even more to share day by day.
At the beginning of December, the Museum of Westclox, a.k.a. Westclox Museum, is officially a 501©3 not-for-profit community organization. The museum will continue to preserve the history of the company, the products, the people, and the historic building and grounds. Plans for organization of numerous special events are now in progress, and those who choose to make a monetary donation or items may deduct the amount/value from their IRS taxes. If this interests you, please feel free to contact us.
Recently, we received a Christmas Gift of a donation of numerous clocks and nearly 200 Tick Talk magazines. Those magazines are irreplaceable and contain real history about so many subjects. These were Company/Employee magazines published at least once a month (sometimes twice a month) and distributed to all employees. Publication began in 1913 and continued through February 1967. I have declared each magazine a genuine time capsule. We have been scanning every copy of these magazine that we get into our computer files, and of course preserving the actual books. Our collection is virtually complete from the 1940s to the end, but fairly incomplete during the prior years. The scanned files are what we use to research history on former employees, products, and history of the company.
We have been asked by many people if we have these scanned books available online in PDF form that they can search themselves. The answer is simply “no”. It would be extremely costly for us to post them and also for people to retrieve them online. Besides, we prefer to have people visit the museum to gain real information. If we find mention of you or a family member who was working here, it is a simple “click” for us to send the information to the printer and present it to you immediately at no charge!
Now, I have sorted all of the recently received Tick Talks, and I am proud to announce that 89 additional magazines will be scanned into our files, while all of the books are properly archived.
Today, I have come up with a Christmas Gift idea – to present a genuine century-old time capsule to the public in a PDF format. This is a Tick Talk that we had not seen before, and it is also in pristine condition. The historical information included here is sure to be of special interest to all. You may open and read this Tick Talk magazine, in a PDF format here on our Museum web site. This will be a one and only presentation. Make sure to go to the Tick Talk magazine tab! Or click the click HERE
“You never know what you might find in the Westclox Museum.”
