From the family albumArthur at his bench, 2017
01 His life
Saturday mornings in the shop.
The bell over the shop door had a soft brass ring. Arthur could usually tell who had come in before he looked up.
People brought him the clocks they had grown up with. He liked to ask where a clock had stood in the house and who wound it. When a repair was finished, there was a second stool beside the bench so they could sit and hear it run.
On Saturday mornings his daughter Nora brought tea. By the time he remembered it, it was often cold. He drank it anyway.
02 Milestones
The years in between.
The apprenticeship
Arthur learned to repair watches at a bench he shared with two other apprentices.
A shop of his own
He rented a narrow room with a good window and moved his workbench into the light.
A second stool
Nora brought in a stool from home. It became the seat for anyone waiting to hear their clock.
One last repair
The last clock he repaired before retiring was the school clock his family had walked past for years.
03 Photographs
At the workbench.
04 Family tributes
The things we still hear.
“I thought he was listening to the clock. Mostly, he was listening to the person who brought it in.”
“He taught me to leave the screws in the order I took them out. I still lay them out that way.”
A memory to listen to
Before the shop opened
Nora’s fictional memory, read by a synthetic voice.
Read the transcript
In winter I took him tea before the shop opened. I’d hear him tap the bench twice, then the tiniest tick you could imagine. He never looked up until he was sure it would keep going.