A Brief History of the Black Forest Cuckoo Clock

The history of its origin is shrouded in mystery. Here is the tale of cuckoo clock history. There are two schools of thought (legends and myths, perhaps) surrounding its beginning. The first legend is that Anton Ketterer, a clock-maker from the Black Forest in Germany, added a cuckoo clock to one of his existing clocks around 1730 and they took off from there. The second myth is that a Bohemian peddler came through the Black Forest and sold some cuckoo clocks to the residents there. They reverse engineered the clocks, copied them, and began the huge cuckoo clock industry the Black Forest knows today. Neither story can be verified, so we’ll just have to be content with what we actually do know for sure.

The Black Forest had a clock making history that began at least 100 years before cuckoo clocks came on the scene. The winters were very harsh in this part of the world, so people stayed indoors for most of it and worked on various types of handcrafted items. We see this in many cultures that experience extreme winter weather. When the cuckoo clock found its way to the Black Forest, it was a natural fit for the lifestyle of the residents in the Black Forest region. They farmed when the weather was temperate, and they built cuckoo clocks during the cold months.

Schilduhr – Shield Clock Style

Cuckoo clock styles have gone through some variations over the years. Initially most clocks were designed in the Schilduhr (or “shield clock”) style. These types were open on the sides (revealing the clock movement) with a half circle above the shield which housed the cuckoo. This was the most common cuckoo clock design from approximately 1750 to 1850.

Bahnhäusle – Railway House Clock Style

In 1850, a clockmaking school in Furtwangen in the Black Forest announced a competition to design a clockcase that could combine the feel of homemade craftsmanship with the professional look of a manufactured clock. The winner of the competition was an Italian architect who had designed the railway guard houses for the new railway that went through the Black Forest. His design integrated grape leaves (from his native Italy) and a clock dial into the façade of the standard railway house. This design was wildly popular and is what spawned the worldwide notoriety of the Black Forest cuckoo clock.

The popular souvenir cuckoo clocks of today originated from this design. Some variations have been made – by adding birds, deer, or leaves. These clocks are instantly synonymous with the Black Forest region of Germany.

The Swiss Chalet Style

At the end of the 1800s, the Swiss felt they could improve on the existing cuckoo clock design, so they created what is known as the Chalet Style cuckoo clock. The chalets generally fall into one of three categories:

• The Black Forest Chalet
• The Swiss Chalet
• The Bavarian Chalet

In addition to the new design, the Swiss also added music boxes, dancing figures, and other moving parts to their cuckoo clocks. These parts could include beer drinkers, woodcutters, children swinging on rope swings, and moving water wheels. These musical cuckoo clocks often played a song on the hour and half hour (for the 1 day clocks) or only on the hour (for the 8 day clocks).

Conclusion

While other countries have made cuckoo clocks (including the US), the Black Forest region of Germany is still the center of production for the cuckoo clock industry and the origin of most cuckoo clock history. It is an industry and history that has become part of the identity of the people of the Black Forest – and loved throughout the world.