Bob Frishman, "Edward Duffield: Philadelphia Clockmaker, Citizen, Gentleman, 1730-1803" (APS Press, 2024)

New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

Edward Duffield (1730–1803) was a colonial Philadelphia clockmaker, whose elegant brass, mahogany, and walnut timekeepers stand proudly in major American museums and collections. Duffield, unlike other leather-apron ‘mechanics,’ was born rich and owned a country estate, Benfield, and many more properties. He was deeply involved in civic and church affairs during crucial years in American history—his lifelong close friend, Benjamin Franklin, was staying at Duffield’s Benfield estate when Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams first discussed the Declaration of Independence. Sally, Franklin’s daughter, brought her family there for extended periods during the Revolution and Franklin’s wife, Deborah, was best friends for fifty years with Duffield’s mother-in-law. Duffield was even one of three executors of Franklin’s will.

In Edward Duffield: Philadelphia Clockmaker, Citizen, Gentleman, 1730-1803 (American Philosophical Society Press, 2024), Bob Frishman catalogs and describes seventy-one known Duffield clocks and instruments and reveals how, during the mid-eighteenth century, they largely were not fabricated from scratch by isolated individuals. He contends that Duffield and his fellow clockmakers were not furniture-makers; they were mechanical artisans whose complex metal machines rang the hours and steadily ticked inside wooden cases made by others. Existing books on Philadelphia clocks have focused on these artifacts as furniture, including their woodwork, cabinetmakers, and decorative aspects. However, Frishman, a professional horologist for nearly four decades, brings his vast expertise to bear on this first comprehensive study of Duffield’s life and work.

Far more than a treatise on pre-industrial horological timekeeping, this book tells the compelling stories of a man, a city, and an era, while deepening our appreciation for Duffield’s stately sentinels—often a colonial American family’s most valuable possession—and the times and places in which their makers lived.

Bob Frishman has professionally repaired nearly 8,000 timepieces and sold more than 1,700 vintage clocks and watches. As a scholar of horology, and assisted by a personal library of 900 books on the subject, he has published more than 100 articles and reviews in Maine Antique Digest, Watch & Clock Bulletin, and elsewhere. Learn more at his website.

Caleb Zakarin is editor at the New Books Network.

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