National Watch and Clock Museum

From the Latest Issue of Our Newsletter

This Month in Horological History

January 9, 1855

On this day, Aaron Dodd Crane received US patent no. 12196 for a “torsion-pendulum for timepieces.” This patent was an improvement on a previous torsion pendulum patent Crane received in 1841, in which there was only one weight or ball. The 1855 patent claimed that by having two or more weights or balls, the torsion pendulum would be freely governed by the centrifugal force created by the motion. The use of multiple balls or weights that can swing outward allows for the creation of a “compensating pendulum of the greatest accuracy and simplicity,” as the patent states.

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