A speaking clock or talking clock is a live or recorded human voice service, usually accessed by telephone, that gives the correct time . The first telephone speaking clock service was introduced in France , in association with the Paris Observatory , on 14 February 1933.
86-447: The format of the service is similar to that of radio time signal services. At set intervals ( e.g. ten seconds) a voice announces (for example) "At the third stroke, the time will be twelve forty-six and ten seconds……", with three beeps following. Some countries have sponsored time announcements and include the sponsor's name in the message. In Australia, the number 1194 was the speaking clock in all areas. The service started in 1953 by
172-703: A "Noon Gun" is fired daily from the citadels in Halifax and Quebec City and from Signal Hill in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador . In the same manner, a Noon Gun has been fired in Cape Town , since 1806. The gun is fired daily from the Lion Battery at Signal Hill . The Noonday Gun serves a similar purpose in Hong Kong . The tradition, which started in the 1860s under British colonial rule, has become
258-581: A "clang" that originates from the Nauvoo Bell on Temple Square, in Salt Lake City, which has been a staple on the station since the early 1960s. In Canada, the national English-language non-commercial CBC Radio One network broadcast the daily National Research Council Time Signal from 5 November 1939 until 9 October 2023. The simulcast would occur daily at 1pm Eastern Time . Its French-language counterpart, Radio-Canada , broadcasts
344-680: A Telephone Talking Clock service; voice announcements of Eastern Time are made every 10 seconds, followed by a tone indicating the exact time. This service is available to the general public by dialing +1 613 745-1576 for English service and +1 613 745-9426 for French service. Long-distance charges apply for those calling from outside the Ottawa/Gatineau area. The voices of the time announcements are Harry Mannis in English and Simon Durivage in French. Dialling 117 in any city connects to
430-459: A Virgin Media line. Sky also have their own service accessible by dialling 123 from a Sky telephone line. Dialling 123 from a few mobile services, such as O2 , also obtains a speaking clock service. The Giffgaff network uses the same service as O2. The service is not available on the 3 mobile telephone network, as they use 123 as the number for their voicemail services. It was also unavailable on
516-416: A day). The Irish speaking clock service was permanently shut down by eir (P&T’s successor) on 27 August 2018 due to lack of use and reliance on ageing equipment. In Italy, the number of the speaking clock ("il numero dell'ora esatta", "the exact time number") was originally 16, the time was given by a recorded female voice. In the mid-seventies, 16 was replaced by 161. Presently, the number to be dialled
602-462: A fixed line or a cellular phone. The time is announced every 10 seconds and alternates between English and Afrikaans languages. An example of an English announcement of the time would be: "When you hear the signal, it will be four hours, fifteen minutes and ten seconds", followed by a short audible tone to signal the exact time previously announced. The voice of the announcements is that of broadcaster and voiceover artist Helen Naudé. Recorded in 1989,
688-435: A national or regional longwave digital signal; for example, station WWVB in the U.S. . The audio portions of the shortwave WWV and WWVH broadcasts can also be heard by telephone. The time announcements are normally delayed by less than 30 ms when using land lines from within the continental United States, and the stability (delay variation) is generally less than 1 ms. However, when mobile phones are used,
774-469: A prize of 10 guineas (equivalent to £900 in 2023) in a competition to find the "Golden Voice". Cain's voice was recorded optically onto the glass disks in a similar way to a film soundtrack. The service was obtained by dialling the letters TIM (846) on a dial telephone, and hence the service was often colloquially referred to as "Tim". However this code was only used in the Director telephone system of
860-522: A second. In 1986, BT allowed Accurist to sponsor its franchise, the first time a sponsor had been used for the service. In the latter years of this sponsorship, it cost 30 pence to call the speaking clock. Accurist announced its withdrawal from the deal and the launch of an online "British Real Time" website on 24 August 2008. During the Cold War , the British Telecom speaking clock network
946-506: A signal that allows automatic synchronization of clocks, and commercial broadcasters still include time signals in their programming. Today, global navigation satellite systems ( GNSS ) radio signals are used to precisely distribute time signals over much of the world. There are many commercially available radio controlled clocks available to accurately indicate the local time, both for business and residential use. Computers often set their time from an Internet atomic clock source . Where this
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#17327985740421032-677: A similar signal at noon. Vancouver radio station CKNW also broadcasts time signals, using a chime every half-hour. Time signals on CBC broadcasts may be delayed up to 3 seconds due to network processing delays between the local radio transmitter and the time signal origin in Ottawa. The CBC's predecessor, the Canadian National Railways Radio network , broadcast the time signal over its Ottawa station , CNRO (originally CKCH), at 9 pm daily and also on its Moncton station, CNRA, beginning in 1923. CNRA closed in 1931 but
1118-653: A single 24-hour clock for the entire world. At a meeting of the Royal Canadian Institute on 8 February 1879 he linked it to the anti-meridian of Greenwich (now 180°). He suggested that standard time zones could be used locally, but they were subordinate to his single world time. Standard time came into existence in the United States on 18 November 1883. Earlier, on 11 October 1883, the General Time Convention, forerunner to
1204-507: A source of time signals: The telegraphic distribution of time signals was made obsolete by the use of AM, FM, shortwave radio , Internet Network Time Protocol servers as well as atomic clocks in satellite navigation systems. Time signals have been transmitted by radio since 1905. There are dedicated radio time signal stations around the world. Time stations operating in the longwave radio band have highly predictable radio propagation characteristics, which gives low uncertainty in
1290-487: A spare), and two or four Computime 1200 baud modems . The voice was provided by Richard Peach , a former ABC broadcaster. The various components were sent for commercial production after a working prototype was built in the Telstra Research Laboratory (TRL). Assmann Australia used a German announcing unit and built a supervisory unit to TRL specifications. Design 2000 incorporated TRL oscillators in
1376-468: A speaking clock that tells the current time in China . Currently 12117. Despite China spanning five time zones, only one time is kept over the country, therefore only one zone related service is required and the same time would be announced regardless of where the call was made. Rates are charged according to the ordinary local number, generally around 0.25 RMB/minute. In Finland the speaking clock service
1462-670: A tourist attraction in recent times. A cannon was fired at one o'clock every weekday at Liverpool , at the Castle in Edinburgh , and also at Perth to establish the time. The Edinburgh " One O'Clock Gun " is still in operation. A cannon located at the top of Santa Lucia Hill, in Santiago , is shot every noon. In Rome , on the Janiculum , a hill west of the Tiber since 1904 a cannon
1548-415: A visual signal, the dropping of a ball, to allow mariners to check the chronometers used for navigation. The advent of electrical telegraphs allowed widespread and precise distribution of time signals from central observatories. Railways were among the first customers for time signals, which allowed synchronization of their operations over wide geographic areas. Dedicated radio time signal stations transmit
1634-651: A year. The speaking clock in New Zealand is run by the Measurement Standards Laboratory of New Zealand . The service is reached by dialling 0800 MSLTIME (0800 675846). MSL has been running the service since 1989. The speaking clock in Poland is known as Zegarynka which means the clock girl . The service became first available in 1936, using a device invented and patented in Poland. It
1720-699: Is Australia 's peak measurement body responsible for biological, chemical, legal and physical measurement and is currently administered within the Australian Government's Department of Industry, Innovation and Science . NMI was created in 2004 from an amalgamation of the National Measurement Laboratory, itself formerly a facility within the CSIRO , with the National Standards Commission and
1806-594: Is "At the Third Stroke it will be one, twenty-one and forty seconds". In 1963, the original device was replaced by more modern recording technology using a magnetic drum, similar to the Audichron technology used in the United States. The company that manufactured the rotating magnetic drum part of the Speaking Clock was Roberts & Armstrong (Engineers) Ltd of North Wembley. They took on the licence from
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#17327985740421892-466: Is 4261. On 1 October 1930, a system was installed in the Haarlem telephone exchange (automated in 1925) which indicated the time using a series of tones, reached by the number 15290. In 1934, electronic engineer and inventor F.H. Leeuwrik built a speaking clock for the municipal telephone service of The Hague using optically recorded speech, looping on a large drum. The female voice was provided by
1978-455: Is a radio station which has a time signal over news. Radio Reloj translates to Clock Radio. Program material, including time signals, that is transmitted digitally (e.g. DAB , Internet radio ) can be delayed by tens of seconds due to buffering and error correction, making time signals received on a digital radio unreliable when accuracy is needed. National Measurement Institute, Australia The National Measurement Institute ( NMI )
2064-555: Is fired daily at noon towards the river as a time signal. This was introduced in 1847 by Pope Pius IX to synchronise all the church bells of Rome. It was situated in Castel Sant'Angelo until 1903 when it was moved to Monte Mario for a few months until it was placed in its current position. The cannon was silenced from the start of WWII for about twenty years until 21 April 1959, the 2712th anniversary of Rome's founding, and has been in use since then. For many years an old cannon
2150-583: Is known as Neiti Aika in Finnish or Fröken Tid in Swedish , both of which mean "Miss Time". The first Neiti Aika service was started in 1936 and was the first automated phone service in Finland. The service is provided by regional phone companies and can be reached by dialling 10061 from any part of the country. The voice of the speaking clock is male or female depending on the phone company service. Nowadays
2236-411: Is not available, a locally connected GNSS receiver can precisely set the time using one of several software applications. One sort of public time signal is a striking clock . These clocks are only as good as the clockwork that activates them, but they have improved substantially since the first clocks from the 14th century. Until modern times, a public clock such as Big Ben was the only time standard
2322-512: Is produced and distributed in a similar manner), though unlike program content which is on a broadcast delay for content concerns, the time signal airs as-is over-the-air, meaning it can sometimes be talked over during a live news event or sports play-by-play. KYW-AM in Philadelphia broadcasts a time signal at the top of the hour along with its jingle . Bonneville International -owned news/talk station KSL (AM-FM) in Salt Lake City uses
2408-532: Is still shot every night at 9 pm. (This gun was brought to Stanley Park in 1894 by the Department of Fisheries originally to warn fishermen of the 6:00 pm Sunday closing of fishing.) The 9:00 pm firing was later established as a time signal for the general population. Until a time gun was installed, the nearby Brockton Point lighthouse keeper detonated a stick of dynamite. Elsewhere in Canada,
2494-656: The American Railway Association , approved a plan that divided the United States into several time zones . On that November day, the US Naval Observatory telegraphed a signal that coordinated noon at Eastern standard time with 11 am Central, 10 am Mountain, and 9 am Pacific standard time. A March 1905 issue of The Technical World describes the role of the United States Naval Observatory as
2580-650: The Audichron . The Audichron Company became the chief supplier of talking clocks in the US, maintained by local businesses and, later, the regional Bell System companies. The service became typically known as the "Time of Day" service, with the term "speaking clock" never being used. Occasionally it would be called "Time and Temperature" or simply "Time". However, the service has been phased out in most states (Nevada and Connecticut still maintain service). AT&T discontinued its California service in September 2007, citing
2666-578: The CBS Radio Network , of which WCBS is the flagship, air a "bong" (at a frequency of 440 Hz – the international standard for the musical note A ) that immediately precedes each top-of-the-hour network newscast. (The same bong could be heard on the CBS Television Network, at the top of the hour immediately before the beginning of any televised program, in the 1960s and 1970s.) An automated "chirp" at one second before
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2752-605: The National Physical Laboratory, UK . In 2011, the BBC reported: "The service still receives 30 million calls each year." A speaking clock service was first introduced in the United Kingdom on July 24, 1936. The mechanism used was an array of motors, glass discs, photocells and valves which took up the floorspace of a small room. The voice was that of London telephonist Ethel Jane Cain , who had won
2838-615: The Nelson Monument, Edinburgh ; the sailors' home Broomielaw , Glasgow; Liverpool and one at Deal, Kent , installed by the Admiralty . Telegraph signals were used regularly for time coordination by the United States Naval Observatory starting in 1865. By the late 1800s, many U.S. observatories were selling accurate time by offering a regional time signal service. Sandford Fleming proposed
2924-453: The Orange network for the same reason. On the occasion of a leap second , such as at 23:59:60 on December 31, 2005, there is an extra second pause between the second and third beeps, to keep the speaking clock synchronised with Coordinated Universal Time : "At the third stroke, the time from BT will be, twelve o'clock precisely. Beep, Beep, <pause> Beep." The current UK time source is
3010-603: The Polytechnic Museum . To hear the current time in Russia , either 100 or 060 can be dialed, depending on the city where this service is available. These calls are free if made from non-mobile phones. In Moscow , the Speaking Clock number is 100 if dialed from within the city, or +7-495-100-. . . . from other countries (where . . . . can be any number). At one time in Moscow, there were advertisements before and after
3096-532: The United Kingdom , the speaking clock can be reached by dialling 123 on a BT phone line; the number may vary on other networks. Every ten seconds, a voice announces: At the third stroke, the time from BT will be (hour) (minute) and (second) seconds. The service was started in 1936 by the General Post Office (which handled telephones at that time) and was continued by BT after its formation in 1980 and privatisation in 1984. Between 1986 and 2008,
3182-409: The "steady and significant decrease" of calls. In Ireland , the speaking clock ( Irish : clog labhartha ) was first offered by P&T in 1970, and was reached by dialling 1191. It announced the time in 24-hour format, in English only, at ten second intervals punctuated by a high pitched signal, as follows: “At the signal it will be HH:MM and …… seconds (signal). P&T operator Frances Donegan
3268-475: The 1194 service on the midnight of October 1, 2019 and Australians no longer have access to this service. A web-based simulation of the 1194 service was created by musician Ryan Monro on the day of the original service's shutdown. In Austria , the speaking clock ("Zeitansage", which literally means "time announcement") can be reached at 0810 00 1503 since 2009. A recorded female voice says: "Es wird mit dem Summerton 15 Uhr, 53 Minuten und 10 Sekunden", meaning "At
3354-421: The 1194 time service would receive the time. A male voice, often known by Australians as "George", would say "At the third stroke, it will be (hours) (minutes) and (seconds) seconds/precisely. (three beeps)" e.g. "At the third stroke, it will be three thirty three and forty seconds". The time announcement was announced in 10 second increments and the beep was 1 kHz. Originally there was only one stroke e.g.:“At
3440-561: The Australian Government Analytical Laboratories. On 1 July 2010, NMI assumed responsibility for trade measurement under a national system. NMI is Australia's peak measurement organisation, responsible for the national measurement infrastructure , and for maintaining Australia's primary standards of measurement. NMI carries out in-depth research programs and provides the legal and technical framework for disseminating measurement standards for
3526-599: The British Post Office to manufacture complete clocks for the telecommunications authorities of Denmark, Sweden and the Republic of Ireland, and a third (spare) clock for the British Post Office. The latter was installed in Bow Street, London. The European clocks were modified for the 24-hour system by lengthening the drum and adding extra heads. Roberts & Armstrong subcontracted the electronic aspects to
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3612-497: The Post Master General's Department, originally to access the talking clock on a rotary dial phone, callers would dial "B074", during the transition from a rotary dial to a DTMF based phone system, the talking clock number changed from "B074" to 1194. It was always the current time from where the call originated, in part due to Telstra 's special call routing systems. Landline, Payphone and Mobile customers who called
3698-501: The Synchronome Company of Westbury. The clocks were designed to run non-stop for 20 years. This system gave way to the present digital system in 1984, which uses a built-in crystal oscillator and microprocessor logic control. The complete apparatus comprises solid-state microchips, occupies no more shelf space than a small suitcase and has no moving parts at all. The BT service is assured to be accurate to five-thousandths of
3784-571: The Telstra 1194 service was migrated to Informatel (which uses its own digital technology, in conjunction with the National Measurement Institute — but kept the original voice of Richard Peach ), whilst the other time services (e.g. hourly pips to radio stations) were retained as a service by Telstra. In May 2006 the remaining Telstra services were withdrawn and the digital hardware was decommissioned. Telstra ended
3870-791: The announcement of the current time; this practice has since ceased. The speaking clock in Spain is run by the Spanish Navy from the Royal Observatory in San Fernando , and can be reached by dialling the number 956599429 free of charge. The speaking clock in Sweden is run by Telia and can be reached by calling 90 510 from landline phones or 08-90 510 from mobile phones. The service is called Fröken Ur which means Miss Clock. It has been in use since 1934. Various voices have stated
3956-682: The beginning of the hour. In New York, WCBS and WINS have distinctive beginning-of-the-hour tones, though the WINS signal is only approximate (several seconds error). WINS also has a tone at 30 minutes past the hour for those setting their clocks. WTIC uses the Morse code V for victory to the tune of Beethoven's 5th Symphony at the beginning of the hour continuously, since 1943. Broadcast stations using iBiquity Digital's " HD Radio " system are contractually required to delay their analog broadcast by about eight seconds, so it remains in sync with
4042-645: The broadcasts continued on CNRO when the station was acquired by the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission in 1933 and by the CBC in 1936 before going national in 1939. In Australia, many information-based radio stations broadcast time signals at the beginning of the hour, and a speaking clock service was also available until October 2019. However, the VNG dedicated time signal service has been discontinued. In Cuba, Radio Reloj
4128-402: The buzzing tone, the time will be 15 hours, 53 minutes and 10 seconds", followed by a short pause and a 1 kHz, 0.25 seconds long beep (even though the announcement "buzzing tone" suggests otherwise). The time is announced in 10 second intervals using the voice of radio host Angelika Lang. Before 2009, the speaking clock was available at local call rates by dialing 1503. Until then, the voice
4214-501: The cities of London , Birmingham , Edinburgh , Glasgow , Liverpool and Manchester . Other areas initially dialled 952, but with the introduction of subscriber trunk dialling it was changed to 80 and later 8081 as more 'recorded services' were introduced. It was standardised to 123 by the early 1990s. The time announcements were made by playing short, recorded phrases or words in the correct sequence. In an interview with Manchester Radio in 1957 Miss Cain said: The way I recorded it
4300-420: The control signals were duplicated and a second bank of Caesium Beam Primary standards installed so the cutover was transparent with no loss of service. This mechanical system was replaced with a digital system in 1990. Each speaking clock ensemble consisted of two announcing units (Zag 500), a supervisory unit (CCU 500), two phase-locked oscillators, two pulse distribution units, a Civil Time Receiver (plus
4386-626: The delays are often more than 100 ms, due to the multiple access methods used to share cell channels. In rare instances when the telephone connection is made by satellite, the time is delayed by 250–500 ms. The audio from the broadcasts is available by telephone by dialling U.S. numbers (303) 499-7111 for WWV (Colorado), and (808) 335-4363 for WWVH (Hawaii). Calls (which are not toll-free) are disconnected after 2 minutes. Loran-C time signals formerly were also used for radio clock synchronization, by augmenting their highly accurate frequency transmissions with external measurements of
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#17327985740424472-564: The digital stream. Thus, network-generated time signals and service cues will also be delayed by about eight seconds. (Because of the delay, when WBEN-AM in Buffalo, New York was broadcasting time markers, and was simulcast on an FM station that broadcast in HD; the FM signal did not carry the time signal. WBEN does not broadcast in HD.) Local signals may also be delayed. The all-news radio stations of
4558-409: The frequency checks to ensure that the system was "on time". From a maintenance point of view, the most important part of the mechanical clocks was to ensure that they were well oiled to minimise wear on the cams and to replace blown bulbs in the optical pickups from the glass disk recordings. When Time & Frequency Standards moved from 59 Collins Street to Clayton Research Labs (3rd Flr. Building M5),
4644-404: The general public needed. Accurate knowledge of time of day is essential for navigation , and ships carried the most accurate marine chronometers available, although they did not keep perfect time. A number of accurate audible or visible time signals were established in many seaport cities to enable navigators to set their chronometers. In Vancouver , British Columbia , a " 9 O'Clock Gun "
4730-562: The hour signals a switch to the radio network broadcast. As an example, KNX , the CBS Radio Network all-news station in Los Angeles, broadcasts this "bong" sound on the hour. However, due to buffering of the digital broadcast on some computers, this signal may be delayed as much as 20 seconds from the actual start of the hour (this is presumably the same situation for all CBS Radio stations, as each station's digital stream
4816-510: The machinery was replaced by a digital device with no moving parts. The voice was provided by actress Joke Driessen and the clock's accuracy is maintained by linking it to the German longwave radio transmitter DCF77 . To comply with international guidelines limiting double-zero to use as an international prefix, the 002 number was changed on 3 December 1990 to 06–8002, and later to 0900–8002. The service still receives approximately four million calls
4902-591: The message included the phrase "sponsored by Accurist"; Accurist withdrew their sponsorship in 2008. The "from BT" part was added, then removed at some point, then reinstated. For times that are an exact minute, "precisely" is substituted for the seconds portion of the announcement. Similarly, announcements for times between the hour and one minute past the hour substitute "o'clock" for the (zero) minutes. Other operators run their own speaking clocks, with broadly similar formats, or redirect to BT's service. Virgin Media have their own service available by dialling 123 from
4988-405: The number of seconds required for the report of the time gun to reach various locations in the city. Because light travels much faster than sound , visible signals enabled greater precision than audible ones, although audible signals could operate better under conditions of reduced visibility. The first time ball was erected at Portsmouth , England in 1829 by its inventor Robert Wauchope . One
5074-438: The offsets of LORAN navigation signals against time standards. As radio receivers became more widely available, broadcasters included time information in the form of voice announcements or automated tones to accurately indicate the hour. The BBC has included time " pips " in its broadcasts from 1922. In the United States many information-based radio stations (full-service, all-news and news/talk) also broadcast time signals at
5160-560: The phase locked oscillator units designed at TRL and controlled by two tone from the Telstra Caesium beam frequency standards. Ged Company built civil time receivers. The civil time code generators and two tone generators were designed and built within TRL. The changeover occurred at 12 noon, September 12, 1990. Each state capital had a digital speaking clock for the local time of day with one access number for all Australia, 1194. In 2002
5246-458: The received time signals. Stations operating in the shortwave band can cover wider areas with relatively low-power transmitters, but the varying distance that the signal travels increases the uncertainty of the time signal on a scale of milliseconds. Radio time signal stations broadcast the time in both audible and machine-readable time code form that can be used as references for radio clocks and radio-controlled watches . Typically, they use
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#17327985740425332-541: The same speaking clock announcements with Naudé's voice are still in use to the present day. Naudé also provided her voice talent to other Telkom services, such as 1023 directory enquiries, as well as the pre-recorded message "The subscriber you have dialled does not exist", which can be heard when dialling an invalid phone number. The speaking clock in Ukraine is run in Odesa and is reached by dialling +380-48-737 6060. In
5418-505: The second was advanced or delayed by one hour and at the 02:00:00 Australian Eastern Standard time, would be switched over to the standby unit. In addition to the speaking clocks, there was ancillary equipment to provide timing signals, 1 pulse per second, 8 pulses per minute and 8 pulses per hour. The Time and Frequency Standards Section in the PMG Research Laboratories at 59 Little Collins Street, Melbourne maintained
5504-483: The service is only reachable on the numbers +32 78 05 12 00 (Dutch Language), +32 78 05 13 00 (French language) and +32 78 05 14 00 (German language). At the time of the number change, the service received 5,000 calls per day. The signal for the speaking clock came directly from the time service of the Royal Observatory of Belgium. First it came from a Zeiss clock, later from an atomic clock. The NRC provides
5590-470: The speaking clock service. Many shortwave radio time signal services provide speaking clock services, such as WWV (voiced by John Doyle) and WWVH (voiced by Jane Barbe ), operated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology from the United States of America. To avoid disruption with devices that rely on the accurate timings and placement of the service tones from the radio,
5676-527: The speaking clock was also used on recordings of proceedings at the Houses of Parliament made by the BBC Parliament Unit, partly as a time reference and partly to prevent editing. On a stereo recording, one track was used for the sound and the other for an endless recording of the speaking clock—without the pips, as these were found to cause interference. There have been five permanent voices for
5762-480: The speaking clock. Temporary voices have been used on special occasions, usually with BT donating the call fees collected to charity. Permanent voices Temporary voices The first automated time service in the United States began in Atlanta, Georgia in 1934 as a promotion for Tick Tock Ginger Ale. Company owner John Franklin modified Western Electric technology to create the machine that would become known as
5848-550: The stroke, it will be……” etc. Prior to automatic systems, the subscriber rang an operator who would quote the time from a central clock in the exchange with a phrase such as "The time by the exchange clock is ……". This was not precise and the operator could not always answer when the subscriber wanted. In 1954, British-made systems were installed in Melbourne (1st floor, City West Exchange) and Sydney . The mechanical speaking clock used rotating glass discs where different parts of
5934-403: The then 24-year-old school teacher Cor Hoogendam, hence the machine was nicknamed Tante Cor (Aunt Cor). In 1969, this system was replaced by a magnetic disk machine resembling a record player with three pick-up arms, telling the time at 10 second intervals followed by a beep. The text was spoken by actress Willie Brill. The service was now called over 130 million times a year. In April 1992,
6020-619: The time were recorded on the disc. A synchronous motor drove the disc with the driving source derived from a 5 MHz quartz oscillator via a multi stage valve divider. This was amplified to give sufficient impetus to drive the motor. Because of the low torque available, a hand wheel was used to spin the motor on start up. The voice was provided by Gordon Gow . The units were designed for continuous operation. Both units in Melbourne and Sydney were run in tandem (primary and backup). For daylight saving time changes, one would be on line while
6106-519: The time. Since 2000 the voice which states the time belongs to Johanna Hermann Lundberg. In 1977 the speaking clock in Sweden received 64 000 000 calls - which is the record for a year. In 2020 the number of calls was about 2 000 per day, meaning a total of a bit less than 1 000 000 calls annually. The speaking clock in South Africa is run by Telkom , the country's national telecommunications provider, and can be reached by dialling 1026 either from
6192-565: The tradition of a factory whistle becomes so deeply entrenched in a community that the whistle is maintained long after its original function as a time keeper became obsolete. For example, the University of Iowa 's power plant whistle has been reinstated several times by popular demand after numerous attempts to silence it. In 1861 and 1862, the Edinburgh Post Office Directory published time gun maps relating
6278-544: The use of the Neiti Aika service has decreased significantly, and the press officer of Auria , the regional phone company of Turku , stated in an article of the Turun Sanomat newspaper that when the company started the service in 1938 it was used 352,310 times in its starting year, compared to 1,300 times in September 2006. In France , the speaking clock ( horloge parlante ) was launched on 14 February 1933 and
6364-418: The voice recording is "notched" clear of some of the tones. Time signal A time signal is a visible, audible, mechanical, or electronic signal used as a reference to determine the time of day . Church bells or voices announcing hours of prayer gave way to automatically operated chimes on public clocks ; however, audible signals (even signal guns) have limited range. Busy seaports used
6450-600: The widespread availability of sources such as mobile phones and computers . As of January 2024, calling 202-762-1401 from anywhere in the US will give a correct time from EST or UTC time . For all area codes in Northern California , and on the West Coast generally, the reserved exchange was 767 which was often indicated by its phoneword , POPCORN; the service was discontinued in 2007. In other locations, different telephone exchanges are or were used for
6536-753: The world, was initiated in 1852 by the Electric Telegraph Company in collaboration with the Astronomer Royal . Greenwich Mean Time was distributed by telegraph from the Greenwich Observatory . This included a system for synchronising the drop of the time ball at Greenwich with other time balls around the country, one of which was atop the Electric's offices in the Strand . Other synchronised time balls were atop
6622-413: Was designed to be used in case of nuclear attack to broadcast messages from Strike Command at RAF High Wycombe to HANDEL units at regional police stations. From there, automatic warning sirens could be started and alerts sent to Royal Observer Corps monitoring posts and other civil defence volunteers equipped with manual warning devices. The rationale for using an existing rather than a dedicated system
6708-460: Was fired "about noon" from a mountain near Kabul . In many Midwestern US cities where tornadoes are a common hazard, the emergency sirens are tested regularly at a specified time (say, noon each Saturday); while not primarily intended to mark the time, local people often check their watches when they hear this signal. In many non-seafaring communities, loud factory whistles served as public time signals before radio made them obsolete. Sometimes,
6794-483: Was generated by an Assmann ZAG500 time announcement device. The announcements were voiced by former switchboard operator Renate Fuczik. Telephone time signals first became available in Vienna in 1929, with an automatic voice announcement being added in 1941. In Belgium, the speaking clock used to be reachable on the numbers 1200 (Dutch language), 1300 (French language), and 1400 (German language). Starting September 2012,
6880-405: Was in jerks as it were. I said: "At the Third Stroke" (that does for all the times), and then I counted from One, Two, Three, Four, for the hours, we even went as far as twenty-four, in case the twenty-four-hour clock should need to be used, and then I said "……and ten seconds, and twenty seconds, and thirty, forty, fifty seconds", and "o'clock" and "precisely". The famous "precisely". So what you hear
6966-601: Was installed in 1833 on the roof of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich , London, and the time ball has dropped at 1:00 pm every day since then. The first American time ball went into service in 1845. In New York City, the ceremonial Times Square Ball drop on New Year's Eve in Times Square is a vestige of a visual time signal. The first telegraph distribution of time signal in the United Kingdom, indeed, in
7052-493: Was reachable on the numbers Russian : "Г 1-98-48" and Russian : "Г 1-98-49" . It was speaking with the recorded voice of Soviet actor and broadcaster Emmanuil Tobiash . In 1937, the first cities to be equipped with this devices were Moscow and Leningrad. In 1969, the first Soviet "Speaking Clock" was replaced in Moscow City Telephone Network by a magnetic tape machine. Old ones were transferred to
7138-683: Was speaking with the recorded voice of actress Lidia Wysocka . The first cities to be equipped with this device were Katowice , Warsaw (dialing number 05), Gdynia , Toruń and Kraków (July 1936). In 1935, Soviet Central Scientific Research Institute of Communications received a government order to design the "Speaking Clock" for Moscow City Telephone Network . "Speaking Clock" was constructed based on cinematic techniques and consists of discs with pulse-density modulation optical marks on photographic tapes, photocell with actuator, and audio tube amplifier. On May 14, 1937 "speaking clock" connected to Moscow City Telephone Network for test operation and it
7224-408: Was that it was effectively under test at all times, rather than being activated (and possibly found to be faulty) only in the event of war. The signals to automatic sirens were sent down the wires of individual (unaware) subscribers for the same reason—a customer would report any fault as soon as it occurred, whereas a problem with a dedicated line would not be noticed until it was needed. A version of
7310-489: Was the first service of its kind worldwide. It is available by dialing 3699 from within France, and was formerly available from overseas by dialing +33 8.36.99. - - . - - (where the - - could be any number). However, since September 2011, calls placed from outside France only work from some countries and networks. In May 2022, French telecom company Orange announced that the service will be discontinued on 1 July 2022, due to
7396-408: Was the original voice. Antoinette Rocks, also a P&T/Telecom Éireann operator, provided the voice of the speaking clock when it was updated to digital technology in 1980. Her voice was selected as part of a competition on a radio phone-in show, RTÉ Radio 1 ‘s Morning Call with Mike Murphy . Listeners voted for one of 8 voices. At its peak, it received almost three million calls a year (about 8,000
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