Connecticut-Birthplace of American Clockmaking

Bristol and Plymouth Connecticut was the center of clockmaking in the 1800's. Eli Terry, Seth Thomas and Silas Hoadley started in Plymouth and expanded to neighboring Bristol. Bristol's attraction was their river and the town was already using water power to run their mills. The clockmakers took advantage of the water power and used it to run their factories.  

Ives and Jerome Brothers, Welch, Hubbell, Brown, Atkins, Boardman, Brewster, Sessions and Ingraham opened shops in Bristol.  Bristol reportedly had about 280 firms that were part of the clock industry.
  
In the beginning clocks were made one at a time by a local clockmaker. This made the early clocks very expensive. Eli Terry ended up producing 4,000 clock movements in 3 years. He used local water power to run machinery and carpenters, Silas Hoadley and Seth Thomas to produce wooden clock parts and Terry came up with interchangeable parts which lead to clocks being mass produced.

Bristol established the Bristol Clock Museum in 1954, now called American Clock and Watch Museum. If you ever get up that way you should stop in to see a part of our history. I have never been there but would love to visit someday.