City Clock

Categories / City Services/Housing and Communal Services
CITY CLOCK. The very first mechanical clock in the city was installed in 1704 in the tower of wooden St. Peter and Paul Cathedral. In 1710, the first striker clock (with chimes) was set up on the belfry of the Church of St. Isaac, another such clock was installed in 1720 on the stone belfry of St. Peter and Paul Cathedral. From the mid-18th century city clocks were set up on private homes and buildings. In the late 18th century, sundial clocks came into use (one sundial clock still survives at the corner of Fontanka River Embankment and Moskovsky Avenue, by Kalinkin Bridge). Friedrich Winter Company installed a clock and chimes on the building of Moskovsky Railway Station (1852), General Admiralty (1869), on the Tower of State Duma (1884), at the Recitation Hall Building (1911) and others. By 1910 there were as many as 70 city clocks in the streets of St. Petersburg. From the 1880s, Siemens and Galsky set up the first electronic city clocks (on the General Admiralty building, on the Imperial Public Library building and others). In 1905, an astronomic clock with 3 clock-dials by Neiger & Sons was installed on the tower of Weights and Measures Chamber (19 Moskovsky Avenue). In the 1930s street electronic clocks were set up throughout the city. A city clock indicating time in different cities of the world can be seen on the Intercity Telephone Station Building (3-5 Malaya Morskaya Street) and at the Central Post Office (9 Pochtamtskaya Street). Impulse clocks with an electronic face panel appeared in the streets and in the subway of Leningrad in 1964. By 2002 there were some 800 city clocks in the streets of St. Petersburg. They are synchronized with the astronomic clock, and their maintenance is carried out by Micron Time Service Company.

Reference: Радченко Б. Г. Часы Ленинграда. Л., 1975; Пипуныров В. Н. История часов с древнейших времен до наших дней. М., 1982.

Y. N. Kruzhnov. Fontanka River Embankment/Saint Petersburg, city
Malaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 5
Malaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 3
Moskovsky Ave/Saint Petersburg, city
Moskovsky Ave/Saint Petersburg, city, house 19
Pochtamtskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 9
Радченко Б. Г. Часы Ленинграда. Л., 1975
Пипуныров В. Н. История часов с древнейших времен до наших дней. М., 1982 SS. Peter and Paul Cathedral
Kalinkin Bridges
Moskovsky Railway Station
Admiralty
Admiralty
City Duma
Elektrosila Plant
Russian National Library
Post Office, Central