It's Nice to Get Up in the Mornin' When You've Got a Talking Clock!

1920

There's an epidemic of talking clocks in the country. Chicago and Philadelphia are the first to be afflicted and it's said that the disease may spread.

Vincent Pinto of Philadelphia has what, to all appearances, is a staid old grandfather's clock, but at times it does things that would surprise, if not shock, all of the younger clocks.

During the early morning hours, it behaves as other clocks have from the time of the first grandfather's. But at 6 it changes. First it booms out the hours — Bong — bong — bong — bong — bong — bong — then it shouts, being heard thruout the house:

"Six o'clock and time to get up."

Mrs. Vincent and her daughter Rose obey and an hour later the clock shouts up the stairs to Pinto and his son: "Breakfast is ready. Hurry down."

Warns Men of Their Work.

"Off to work, now it's time," the clock warns the men of the family at 7:30 and at 9 a. m. it informs Mrs. Pinto, "It's time to go to your marketing."

And so it goes, all day long, that nobody in the house may forget any duties. At 11 o'clock at night the clock, imitating Pinto's voice in its deepest and sternest tones, says:

"Time to go home, young man, it's 11 o'clock; time to go home."

Miss Rose's "young man" gets his hat and goes.

Pinto and his son built the clock and installed the talking apparatus after eleven months' work. Pinto made his own records, and he can change the clock's conversation whenever he wishes. It is rumored he sometimes stops the talking apparatus on Sundays and other days when he is at home.

Here's the Chicago Edition.

But Oscar Lindholm of Chicago, a machinist, declares that the Philadelphia clock is an infringement on a patent that he obtained six months ago. Lindholm has patented an alarm clock that yells instead of ringing.

The invention can be adjusted to an ordinary phonograph and the record is made to wake you in the manner that best suits your tastes and nationality.

If you're an ex-service man you may be delighted to hear the old familiar strains of "You gotta get up, you gotta get up, you gotta get up in the morning."

Or if you happen to be Scotch you can have the song that Harry Lauder made famous — "Oh, it's nice to get up in the mor-r-rning, but it's better to lie a-bed!"

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Aug. 7, 1920, p. 5.