The Vetters in Oz: Once Upon a Time

I remember the first time I saw one of my teachers someplace other than at school. It seemed strange… it had never occurred to my seven-year old mind that they existed anywhere other than my classroom. A similar dynamic is true for police officers, nurses and other people who serve the public. An adjacent thought is the difficulty in visualizing people working in a profession other than the one they’re presently in. I bring it up because our friend Reinier falls into that category. Like many (possibly a majority) people in Australia and New Zealand, he chose to learn a trade rather than go to University. He completed an apprenticeship with a local clockmaker and went into business for himself for a number of years. Vince and I got to know Reinier because he is the pastor of our local church. He was called to the ministry in his early twenties, but his love for the chronograph endures. On his days off you will probably find him in his workshop (used to be the garage) or at a flea market, happily searching for his next "prize."

If you didn’t know this about Reinier, you’d give yourself a dope slap (as I did) when you found out because his home is chockablock with clocks, a timepiece in every spare nook and cranny. His family is accustomed to the 3 to 4 minutes of multi-tonal chiming that occurs at the top of each hour. (It’s impossible to synchronize that many clocks – he has almost 100 of them.) They rolled their eyes when I declared it charming: the loud clocks, soft clocks, chimes, gongs, cuckoos, you-name-it, all joining in a symphony of sound. But really, there’s something comforting about hearing the sweep of the second hand and the gentle chime at the quarter hour, a kind of reassurance that someone is keeping track of things for me and the rest of the world.

Two Men, an Idea and a Clock

I can’t count the number of times we have returned home much later than planned because our clockmaker friend and my engineer husband got to talking about pendulums and escapement mechanisms. So it was only a matter of time before my enjoyment of soothing tick-tock sounds merged with Vince’s love of gears and all things mechanical to bring forth an idea: hey, do you think Reinier would make a clock for us? What a great souvenir of Australia that would make! We asked, he said yes, and here are the results.

As if having someone you really like make a clock from scratch for you isn’t fabulous enough, the coolness factor took a quantum leap when Reinier invited – no, required – Vince to participate in the project. That’s like asking a puppy if it wants to play :-> We chose a grandfather clock, but it wouldn't be your grandfather’s grandfather clock. It would have a modern twist: it will hang on the wall and have glass sides so we can watch the gears in action. Reinier made sketches, chose the wood, and crafted the cabinetry in his workshop. A note about the wood - it is from the Jarrah tree, found only in Western Australia. It is extremely hard and rather dark. The closest American comparison would be mahogany. Reinier then made each gear by hand and Vince’s role at this point was mostly to watch and learn. After a year of working on it in their spare time, they had a clock!

The final task was what Reinier called “deconstruction.” They took the clock apart one piece at a time, placed them in a chemical soup of sorts inside a large “cooker” which heated to quite a high temperature, and vibrated all the while, ultimately removing every speck of dirt, grime or dust. During this process, the ladies were provided an opportunity to share in the excitement. Translation: the fellows were very proud of their accomplishment and wanted to tell us all about it. Reinier’s wife Trudy had the foresight to take lots of photos during each stage, and she graciously shared them with me. Once the parts had cooled down, Vince had the honor of putting everything back together, under Reinier’s watchful eye. I’m sure he bit a hole in his tongue as he allowed Vince to remember, explore and ponder where everything had originally fit. He jumped in occasionally, but the final assembly was done by Vince himself. They allowed Trudy and me to watch them, and once I even got to help fit a small component. I suspect it’s because my smaller fingers could maneuver the tweezer-like apparatus into a very small space. It was a privilege and an honor.

About an hour later everything was back together and inside the cabinet. Before you could say grandfather clock they had hung it on the wall and were engaged in final tweaking. We held our breath as Vince cranked it up and set the pendulum swinging. Tick, tock, tick, tock, and woo-hoo! We had ourselves a clock, a grand memory, and a wonderful symbol of our friendship with the Noppers family.

Reinier had a couple of small items to add, like a closing mechanism for the cabinet, so he kept the clock a few weeks longer. The day before Vince’s birthday I invited Trudy & Reinier to bring the clock over, have some cake with us, and give Vince a happy surprise. They

did, and we did, and Vince was thrilled. Here are some pictures of our awesome clock and the men who made it tick.