Clock-Watchers to Have Quite a Time of It Today

For some people, this will be an ordinary Sunday when the only out-of-the-ordinary thing to do is grab the wristwatch and alarm clock and set them back an hour.

But for others, the tasks that mark the end of daylight-saving time are extraordinary.

Try doing it to 2,500 clocks. Or to old grandfather models whose hands were not meant to be turned back. Or with the newfangled programmable quartz clocks that work like computers and have to be re-programmed for a new time. Or with the tower clocks.

Joe C. Lyons, owner of Lyons Clocks in Costa Mesa and in Dana Point, planned to spend most of Saturday afternoon and evening, stretching to midnight, resetting time. In his Costa Mesa store alone, all 3,600 square feet are covered with about 2,500 clocks.

He also knows he will field phone calls all day from people who don’t know how to turn back time. “It’s just absolutely amazing” how many people call for advice when daylight-saving takes effect, Lyons said.

“The worst thing they can do is turn the hands backwards,” Lyons said of the grandfather clocks. The older models of the floor clocks were not built to go backwards, so people who insist on nudging the hands back may end up paying for repairs.

The best way to set back the time on a grandfather clock is to stop the pendulum, said Mel Murphy, owner of Elegance in Time shops in Huntington Beach, Brea and Orange.

“When the hour is up, take the pendulum to the left or the right and let it go and the clock will start running,” Murphy said.

Murphy said he has a total of about 7,000 clocks at three stores. Setting them back is not all that time-consuming because only some are kept ticking.

But Lyons’ clocks all tick, such a “soothing and relaxing” sound, he said, that he doesn’t mind the semiannual ritual.

Nonetheless, Lyons prefers the spring, when clocks are advanced by an hour. “It’s much easier,” he said.

At Clocks Americana in Orange, owner Vern B. Osborn said many customers ask how to set back the newer quartz clocks, the type that play tunes and need to be re-programmed for a new time. “We’ll have people almost in a line to get these clocks re-programmed,” Osborn said.

“Hopefully, after doing it for them twice a year, over the next couple of years, they’ll remember how it’s done,” Osborn said.

The big tower clocks also can present a headache, Murphy said.

“If it’s not set right, people get mad at you,” Murphy said. “If you have a store in front of a big clock, and it’s not right, they’ll get mad because they count on it.”