They would begin one or two dozen at a time, using no machinery, but cutting the wheels and teeth with a saw and jack-knife.
Mr.Terry would make two or three trips a year to the New Country, as it was then called, just across the North River, taking with him three or four clocks, which he would sell for about twenty-five dollars apiece.
This was for the movement only.

In 1807 he bought an old mill in the southern part of the town, and fitted it up to make his clocks by machinery.

About this time a number of men in Waterbury associated themselves together, and made a large contract with him, they furnishing the stock, and he making the movements.

With this contract and what he made and sold to other parties, he accumulated quite a little fortune for those times.

The first five hundred clocks ever made by machinery in the country were started at one time by Mr.Terry at this old mill in 1808, a larger number than had ever been begun at one time in the world.
Previous to this time the wheels and teeth had been cut out by hand; first marked out with square and compasses, and then sawed with a fine saw, a very slow and tedious process.Capt.Riley Blakeslee, of this city, lived with Mr.Terry at that time, and worked on this lot of clocks, cutting the teeth.