Just in time
A huge 73-inch-diameter clock face created by Keim Lumber was built to serve as a way to display a set of original clock hands that adorned the courthouse tower when it was built in the summer of 1886. The clock was placed on the second floor on Friday, July 6.
Whether the county work day in the Holmes County courthouse is just beginning or winding down for its employees, it will forever be 1:15, at least according to the beautiful historical clock that was recently installed on the courthouse’s second floor.
That huge 73-inch-diameter clock face that was created by Keim Lumber was built to serve as a way to display a set of original clock hands that adorned the courthouse tower when it was built in the summer of 1886. The newest addition to the courthouse décor was put in place on Friday, July 6.
For Brad Conn, Holmes County Probate and Juvenile Court bailiff, taking the necessary steps to preserve the hands and prominently display them for people to see was an exciting addition to the décor at the courthouse.
“For 130 years those clock hands were part of the courthouse clock tower, and they have seen a lot of Holmes County history come and go,” Conn said. “We all felt it was important to preserve the hands as part of our history.”
When Phil Wright of the Tower Clock Company came to repair the tower and the clock in November of 2016, he tried to save as much of the former clock tower as possible. Conn said when it came time for the old clock to come down, he couldn’t bear the thought of getting rid of the clock hands, of which there were four sets made with the set on the clock that was recently installed being the best of the sets.
“When I found out they were removing the clock hands, I was curious as to what they were going to do with them,” Conn said. “I felt that we needed to restore them and display them so that the public could appreciate that part of our history.”
Conn went through the proper channels, discussing the idea of preserving the clock hands for the public with Probate and Juvenile Court Judge Thomas Lee and court administrator Glennis Menuez to get their blessing and input in pursuing a way to preserve and display the clock hands.
“They immediately agreed with the vision I had to find a way to preserve the hands, and they were very supportive, and that was all I needed to move forward,” Conn said.
Conn brought in Tim Morris, the county buildings and grounds administrator, and the two began constructing ideas on how they could best display the hands.
“Tim’s knowledge and input was a huge part of this whole process, and I think that if he had not gotten involved, we’d still be talking about what we should do with the clock hands,” Conn said.
The original plan was to build a display case that would be tastefully displayed somewhere in the courthouse. As they discussed options, the plan evolved into something much bigger, and the clock face idea took form.
The original plan for the clock face was to design it with eight different types of Ohio wood with each wood being a pie-shaped section. They soon realized that option was not very cost-effective because of the design and how labor-intensive the project would become.
Instead they found a more cost-effective way to display the hands. The clock is made out of a light-colored hard maple wood that sets off the black sugar pine hands of the former courthouse clock. Keim Lumber completed the clock by adorning it with large black Roman numerals. While the clock is not in working condition, there was a reason it was set at 1:15.
"Once we figured out that we were going to display the hands on a large clock, we had to figure out what time we wanted the hands to be in because that is what they will be in forever,” Conn said. “We tried to figure out what significant thing happened at a specific time in Holmes County history that we could affix the time to. We couldn’t come up with anything.”
The answer came courtesy of Wright, who had taken photographs of the clock tower and the clock before it was taken down. The final time the clock tower’s original clock had ever displayed was 1:15, and that seemed like the ideal time to display on the clock.
“When we saw the picture, it was a no-brainer,” Conn said. “It’s a neat way to display a piece of our history, and we do have a lot of people who come into the courthouse and are fascinated with the architecture of the building. However, we do have a lot of empty walls throughout the courthouse, and to me that is just an empty canvas waiting to tell a story of our history. Hopefully this will be here long after we have all come and gone.”
Keim Lumber had created the clock, and it was complete, but the task of placing it on the second floor became the next obstacle. While that might not seem like a big deal, it was.
“That clock is extremely heavy, and the one thing I wish we could have done before we hung the clock was to figure out how much it weighs,” Conn said with a laugh. “It was everything we could do to put it in place with four pretty strong guys.”
The process took the biggest ladder they could find, and Morris, Conn and two other strong volunteers placed the clock on a French bracket.
“Tim and I saw the design on paper, and we had these visions of what it might look like upon completion, but we were really excited to finally get to see it being displayed in place on the courthouse wall,” Conn said.
Beside the second-floor clock is a paper that describes in detail much of the history of the courthouse, the clock and a short history of how the clock came to be put in place.
Conn said the hope is that with this newest addition to the courthouse, there will be a push to include more historical memorabilia to the walls of the courthouse.
One other such piece is a large black and white photograph of prominent Ohio architect Joseph W. Yost, the designer of the Holmes County courthouse. Yost designed not only the Holmes County courthouse, but also courthouses in the counties of Guernsey, Belmont, Miami and Perry. According to Conn, the look and appeal of each of these architectures is distinctly Yost.
“It’s nice for people to see who built our courthouse, and this is a chance to honor the many who built such a beautiful part of our county,” Conn said. “If you look at the courthouse in Guernsey County, you’ll see a lot of very similar aspects.”
The clock was delivered to the courthouse on Oct. 27, 2017. It was secured in one of the vaults on the second floor until it was placed on the same floor on the east side of the hallway on Friday, July 6.
Conn said that during the time the clock was secured, painting in the courthouse was being discussed. "We didn’t want to rush into hanging the clock and then take it down months later to have the wall painted," he said.
When asked how heavy the clock is, all Conn could say is this: "It’s heavy. It took all we had to muscle the clock into its new location.”