On 10/31/14, 7:34 PM, Michael A. Terrell wrote:
We had five minutes between classes. Then the principal retired. His
replacement cut it to three minutes between classes and turned off the
bells even though the clock system needed a lot of work. It turned into
a real mess when hundreds of kids were sent to the principal's office
for being tardy for each class. The teachers used whatever their watch
said, and no two were the same.

Our school had a Western Union clock system governed by a grandfather
clock in the office. Occasionally we'd see classroom clocks jump because
the principal was adjusting the grandfather clock.

I believed in punctuality, being neither late nor early. I'd generally
reach my desk 10 seconds before the bell. All we had at home was a 3"
electric clock on the stove. That couldn't be read precisely, so I
relied on my internal clock.

Sometimes on a Monday morning I'd be 10 seconds late instead of 10
seconds early. I couldn't reset my internal clock on the principal's
whim, so I'd be 10 seconds late every day. By Friday, teachers would be
complaining about my continuing presence in detention. The principal
would fix his clock and Monday the school would be back in sync with me.

He could have saved detention teachers a lot of unpleasantness if he'd
checked with me or the Naval Observatory before tampering with the
grandfather clock.