The clock of the Old Barracks

Bet­ween 1861–1863 inf­an­try bar­racks were built on the so cal­led Kurz­weil­platz or Lei­su­re Squa­re (today: Kaser­nen­platz) whe­re until the begin­ning of the 19th cen­tu­ry the hog mar­ket and the fair were held and the occa­sio­nal tra­vel­ling cir­cus stop­ped to perform.

The buil­ding sites were made available by the City of Lucer­ne free of char­ge in order to pro­mo­te the buil­ding of the inf­an­try bar­racks. The three win­ged buil­ding was model­led after Ger­man stan­dards of the 19th cen­tu­ry. Johann Kas­par Wolff desi­gned the plans; Gus­tav Moss­dorf, a local archi­tect („Gott­hard buil­ding”), signed respon­si­ble for the con­s­truc­tion. In the begin­ning the inf­an­try bar­racks offe­red accom­mo­da­ti­on for 1111 sol­diers and the buil­ding was used until 1935 in this capa­ci­ty. In the 60s of the 20th cen­tu­ry the buil­ding was used as pro­vi­sio­nal school for the lower gra­de secon­da­ry school of the can­ton but was then demo­lished in 1971; today on Kaser­nen­platz you will find the motor­way inter­ch­an­ge. The for­mer orpha­na­ge, a buil­ding in Clas­si­cal style by Josef Sin­ger, was rebuilt on the site of the inf­an­try bar­racks and today hou­ses the Muse­um of Natu­ral Sciences.

The clock-maker Leonz Suter from Klee­wald, Rothen­burg LU, desi­gned the clock for the inf­an­try bar­racks on Kaser­nen­platz in 1862. The move­ment was manu­fac­tu­red in a peri­od of tran­si­ti­on bet­ween hand craf­ted and indus­tri­al­ly pro­du­ced clocks. The balan­cing weight of the minu­te hand is arran­ged hid­den behind the clock-face.

The res­cue of the clock in 1971 was quite fan­ta­stic. The old bar­racks had been pre­pared for blas­ting. The explo­si­ves expert, two assistants and Franz Ger­man, the mana­ger of the real estate port­fo­lio of the hos­pi­tal of the can­ton of Lucer­ne, were sit­ting within sight of the bar­racks at the restau­rant “Gal­li­ker” on Kaser­nen­platz having drinks tog­e­ther after work. Ger­man asked about the clock of the bar­racks and the explo­si­ves expert told him that he would be wel­co­me to dig it out from the rub­ble after the blas­ting on the fol­lo­wing day. But Ger­man deci­ded to dis­mant­le the beau­tiful clock of the old bar­racks on the spot with the hel­ping hand of four hos­pi­tal co-workers. And so the clock was saved.