There was a time when I thought that an alarm clock was a nuisance to have because of its rude awakening from a wonderfully deep sleep, as I could not dilly-dally, but had to face reality, and get out of bed to get ready for school and/or work. However, I soon learned that these clocks are special, in that they can be used to take your medicine, keep appointments, and organize your daily or weekly activities.
Of course, these particular kinds of clocks are designed to make a loud noise at a set time and the primary use of these clocks is to awaken people from their sleep. However, a person may just want to take a short nap for a short period of time and set the alarm to be wakened up at a certain time of the day or night.
To stop the sound of these clocks can always be done by pressing a button or moving a button from an on to off position. Some of these clocks have a remote control that you can use without having to get close to, or even touch the alarm; however, some stop automatically after being left unattended. The classical analog clock with an integrated alarm has an extra hand that is used to specify the time to activate the alarm. Traditional mechanical clocks with alarm have one or two bells that ring, but digital alarm clocks can make other noises as well. In a mechanical bell clock, a mainspring drives
a gear that propels a clack valve back and forth between two bells or between the sides inside a single bell. On the electric bell-style alarm clocks, the bell rings with an electromagnetic circuit and an armature that repeatedly turns the circuit on and off. Battery powered clocks with an integrated alarm will make a loud buzzing sound or other similar noises. Novelty clocks with alarm can speak, laugh, or sing. Progressive clocks, new in the market, can have a different alarm for different times.
Ancient Alarm Clocks
In the ancient period, people used sundial (which measured the time by the use of the sun, candle clock (sticks of incense used to estimate the time), hourglass (fine sands poured through a small hole at a constant rate), and water clock (determined time by using water).
First Mechanical Alarm Clock
The first mechanical alarm clock can be traced in the 14th century in Europe. These early clocks had a ring of holes in the clock dial. It was set by putting a pin in the appropriate hole. During that year the alarms were put on the mantel, wall, and grandfather clocks.
Levi Hutchins, a 26-year-old clock maker in concord, New Hampshire would get up every day at 4:00 a.m. to work on his clocks, but when he overslept, he became very troubled. He thought and thought of a clock that would wake him up promptly at 4:00 a.m. that would have an alarm of some kind. In the year 1787, he built a cabinet, transferred the inner mechanism of one of his large brass clocks into it, and inserted a pinion or gear. When the minute hand of the clock reached and tripped the pinion at 4:00 a.m., the movement of the pinion set a bell in motion, and the bell made sufficient noise to awaken him. Hutchins never bothered to patent his alarm clock, as he was not interested in money, he was just interested in not oversleeping
Fortunately, gone are the days when time was measured by the sun, moon, candles, or hourglass. Overall, alarm clocks are "here to stay". Even though these type of clocks may wake us up from, let's say, a wonderful dream or wonderful nap, we must obey these clocks, and shut them off, so that we can go on with our busy daily lives.
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