"Horology's Great Collectors" is the fifth NAWCC Time Symposium created and organized by Bob Frishman since he was selected to head the TIme Symposium Committee in 2014. These annual educational events, initiated by the late Ward Francillon, began in the early 1980's and have convened in all but two years since then. Many horological topics have been addressed and many important speakers have shared their wisdom and expertise. Please see the Arthur page for each year's James Arthur Lecture speaker and topic. For each of the events Bob Frishman produced, he built related websites which remain available for viewing and which have links to professional video-recordings of each presentation. Click on the blue symposium titles below to visit those websites. You are encouraged to take advantage of this excellent opportunity to learn more about horology, and hear from many of its international experts, exactly as each year's attendees did when in those audiences. Please join us in person in New York City in October, 2022!
2016 - Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library
Henry F. du Pont had a special interest in clocks and timekeeping. He acquired many fine examples for the museum during his lifetime. Since his passing, more clocks have been added to the collection which now numbers more than 100. Within the museum galleries is a faithful reconstruction of the clock and wood-working shop of the Dominy family who worked on Long Island from the mid 1700’s to the mid 1800’s.
2017 - Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Since the invention of mechanical timekeeping in the 13th century, clocks and watches have appeared in fine art classics. From Titian to Jamie Wyeth, from Brueghel to Hopper to Dali, artists have portrayed timekeepers in symbolic, metaphorical, allegorical and documentary roles. They never appear simply by accident.
2018 - Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation
Largely ignored are the crucial links between 19th-century New England clock and watch manufacturing, and Henry Ford's pioneering advances in automotive mass-production using interchangeable parts, machine tools, and assembly-line methods This symposium explored these themes and offered expert presentations on horology - automobile connections such as car clocks and auto-race timing.
2021 - Museum of the American Revolution
Participants learned of the constant and vital role of timekeeping, and the active roles of clockmakers such as David Rittenhouse, in the birth of our republic. Throughout the Itinerary of General Washington and in many other period accounts, soldiers’ diaries, and orderly reports penned during our War of Independence, there are many references to specific hours of the day and night. Such reports principally were from the field, so pocket watches were the likely instruments, along with portable sundials also popular. And in Colonial cities, domestic and foreign-made clocks stood in halls, hung on walls, sat on mantels, and displayed and rang the hours from public towers.