The History of Waking Up: National Watch and Clock Museum Alarm Clock Exhibit | witf.org

"Everyone can relate to that annoying alarm clock that wakes you up in the morning," says Katie Knaub, Museum Educator at the National Watch and Clock Museum in Columbia, "We just wanted to create something that everyone can relate to."

The museum will be opening its Wake Up exhibit later this month with an exhaustive display of various alarm clocks from ancient times,to today. They've even got some rather quirky, and frankly dangerous, variations on early alarm clocks. One used the sun to light a fuse which fired a small canon. Another struck a match to light an oil lamp and sometimes caught houses on fire.

The museum houses a thorough collection of all types of timepieces, from sundials to wall clocks and digital watches. "We have a mission which is to tell the whole story," says Noel Poirier, the Director of the museum, "So our collection includes objects from all over the world, [an] Asian incense clock...right up to modern calculator wrist watches."

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http://www.witf.org/arts-culture/2013/04/history-of-waking-up.php