$61K clocktower parts repairs, purchase approved

Exactly one week after the Jasper County Board of Supervisors received the green light from the county attorney’s office, officials have voted to bring the historic courthouse clocktower back to life for the second time in a year.

With board chair Denny Carpenter absent, the remaining supervisors approved $61,700 in bids Tuesday dealing with the clocks repair — fixes which were deemed necessary after the clock quit working in August 2018, just two months after a full restoration project was complete.

The first vote authorized the purchase of 1905 Seth Thomas No. 16 clock from New York-based Essence of Time for $20,500. This will be used for needed replacement parts on the existing timepiece in the clocktower.

According to County Maintenance Director Adam Sparks, the parts being replaced are mechanical not exterior aesthetic pieces of the clock.

“It’s just for the clock mechanisms, just so everybody knows that,” Sparks said. “It’s not for the faces, plates, the arms or the glass or anything like that. It’s for the mechanism that sits inside the clocktower.”

The second, two-part bid was for labor associated with the parts installation, including two auto-clock winders and resealing all the glass for the original dials on the clock. These projects were awarded to Mechanical Watch Supply, LLC of Minneapolis for a total of $41,200.

Mechanical Watch Supply bid on the original project in 2017. Their bids approved Tuesday were close to their original pitch for the clock tower.

When the restoration was first proposed in 2017, the final estimate for the total project was $95,000. The bell and clock were first installed at the courthouse in 1910. The bell had been displayed on the courthouse lawn after being removed from the clock tower and was remounted during the restoration phase. Two televisions were installed in the west lobby of the courthouse to stream continuous, real-time footage of the clock’s inner workings and mechanics.

The county was awarded a $44,500 Historical Resource Development Grant from the State Historical Society to complete the clocktower work, but Sparks said Tuesday they have only received half of the grant money. The remainder will be dispersed after the project architect signs off on the restoration, deems it complete and the paperwork is submitted to the historical society.

The roughly $22,000 in grant money remaining will now go toward the clock parts purchase and new repairs.

“It’s definitely unfortunate that we came to this point, but we’re here,” Board Vice Chair Doug Cupples said. “ ... We just took the long way to get there. It will be nice to have some backup parts, too.”

According to Cupples, Smith’s Bell and Clock Service did not receive payment in full for its work. In a statement released during the Feb. 5 board meeting, county attorney Scott Nicholson said the county was “working to resolve some legal issues with the company originally hired to refurbish the courthouse clock.”

Officials and county government staff have been careful not to release many details on the issues surrounding the legal dispute with Smith Bell and Clock Service.

Contact Mike Mendenhall at 641-792-3121 Ext 6530 mmendenhall@newtondailynews.com