1910s Big Ben Cope Gdansk public sphere time tower clock

G & F Cope tower clock

The sound of tower clock manufactured by G & F Cope. The recording was realized in the Tower Clock Museum, branch of Gdańsk History Museum (Poland).
The clock was manufactured in 1911 by the G & F Cope & Co. company from Nottingham (Great Britain). The enterprise was established in 1845 and it operates until today.
Rate mechanism of the clock was based on Denison’s III gravity escapement (the system rarely used in continental Europe). The same escapement mechanism is applied in the clock of the British Parliament, commonly known as “Big Ben”. The recorded clock is equipped with the hour striking mechanism of the ratchet system.
Before the popularization of house clocks and pocket clocks, tower clocks were used to indicate the time in the town. Many of them were equipped with the hour striking mechanism thanks to which it was possible to find out what the current time was also from a distance.

Sound recordist: Monika Widzicka
Photographer: Piotr Leszczyński
Video recordist: Piotr Leszczyński

Specs:

Decade:
Filesize:
Duration:
Channels:
1910s
10.8 MB
1 min 1 s
2 (Stereo)
Sample rate:
Bit rate:
Bit depth:
44.1 kHz
1411 kb/s
16 bit

Recorded on January 29, 2015
Tower Clock Museum
Gdańsk, POLAND
Creative Commons License