Beard Brothers, St. Louis, Missouri

Model - Type 2. 1878. This rare time lock was part of the first order of 25 movements made by Beard Brothers to the E. Howard Co. of Boston, Mass. in November of 1878. The principals, G. N. and E. J. Beard made their first time lock, the Model 1, in early 1878, it is unknown how many were produced, with only one known survivor today. The Model 2 was introduced later that same year. The Beard Brothers company made a total of 189 time locks until 1886 when the patent rights were sold to Mosler Safe Co., Hamilton, Ohio. The patent holder, Phinneas F. King joined the company as well. This explains the strong similarities of this and Mosler's first time lock. Later, Yale and Holms used a design similar to this where two movements are controlled by one dial. Five of this type are known to exist. (1)

In April of 1887 Mosler placed an order of 100 of this model of time lock from Howard. The first 86 locks had the decorative damascening on the dial center. The later 14 did not and that design, along with some other minor changes to the dial, is the one adopted by Mosler in their order.

There are four of this style of lock known to exist. Movement #123, case #23. file 102