Dysons Time Ball Building – Leeds, UK - Town Clocks on Waymarking.com

This shop was established before Greenwich Meant Time became the standard time throughout the UK.. Before the industrial revolution there was little need to have perfectly accurate time. However with the advent of railways, it was difficult to organise timetables when individual cities all had their own time. Leeds was 6 minutes 10 seconds behind Greenwich Mean Time.

By 1852 the Greenwich observatory in London started to send telegraphs to railway stations at 13:00 each day, so that they could set their clocks to London Time. The railways could then more easily set their timetables, using what became known as Railway Time. The railway stations were also allowed to pass on the time signal to local clock and watch makers.

This company called Dysons took advantage of the facility to set their time accurately to London time and use this as a selling point. As well as setting the time on the clock, the 13:00 time signal triggered a time ball, as a visual signal that it was one o’clock. This was the same mechanism that Greenwich used to signal 13:00 hours.

In this mechanism a large ball was raised to the top of a long vertical pole. At the moment the time signal was received the ball was released and it dropped to the bottom of the pole.

The time ball is on the top of a dome on the building.

One of the clocks has 1865 displayed on it, the date the company was originally founded. It is mounted at 90% to the building, has a small statue of Chronos (old Father Time) on top, and the legend Tempus Fugit (Time flies) below it.

A second clock was apparently erected to celebrate the owner’s wife’s birthday. However the minutes on the clock face are replaced with John Dyson 25 & 26, the owners name and the building’s number on the street.

Time balls continued to be used throughout the UK until 1924, when the telegraph system was replaced with a radio signal. Very few still survive.

The clock business closed in 1990 and the building now houses an Indian Restaurant the AM kitchen and Restaurant.

Status: Not Working Display: Mounted Year built: Not listed Web link to additional info: Not listed

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Photo of clock.

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Date Logged Log User Rating   11/19/2021 OrientGeo visited it