It was a landmark that York residents set their watches by for nearly 100 years.

Back in 2005, the famous clock at the Terry’s chocolate factory stopped ticking as the works around it fell silent and production moved overseas.

The Clock Tower and the rest of the 1920s factory buildings were Grade II-listed and the complex has since been converted into housing, offices and a care home – yet for the past 18 years the clock has not worked.

Now it is keeping time again, thanks to the efforts of a group of heritage clockmakers who scoured the country to find replacement parts after discovering the original mechanism had mysteriously disappeared.

York's famous Terry's Clock Tower on Bishopthorpe Road, York, is working once again after a rebuild by Clockmakers Smith of Derby.
The site has undergone a major development over recent years and today at midday saw the final stage by having the clock working once again after 18 years. — York's famous Terry's Clock Tower on Bishopthorpe Road, York, is working once again after a rebuild by Clockmakers Smith of Derby. The site has undergone a major development over recent years and today at midday saw the final stage by having the clock working once again after 18 years.

Developers P J Livesey and Henry Boot Developments have spent £60,000 restoring the clock and commissioned experts to repair it.

Smith of Derby took on the job, but found that the rare Waiting Train Clock system, powered by an electrical impulse from a master clock, was no longer in place.

It has still not been traced, so the specialists gathered together similar original parts from auction houses and collections to recreate the workings.

Terry’s was founded in York in 1767, though it did not adopt its name until Joseph Terry took over the business in 1830. By 1924, it had expanded so much that a modern factory on the Knavesmire was built, consisting of five distinctive redbrick buildings; the head offices, time office, factory itself, Clock Tower with boilerhouse, and liquor store. Famous products like the Chocolate Orange were produced at the site, and during World War Two it made chocolate for prisoners of war and lifeboat ration packs. The Clock Tower was used for firewatching.

It remained a family business until 1993, with the factory and clock visible from the Terrys’ home, Goddards House, a mansion now run by the National Trust. The new owners, Kraft, announced the York plant’s closure in 2004.

At the time the complex was listed, the clock machinery was considered to be intact and was valued by the Electrical Horology Group and Antiquarian Horological Society, as it was believed to be one of only two surviving examples of the Waiting Train system still in operation.

The tower and boilerhouse have become 22 apartments, with the site owners planning to allow public access into the tower at certain times.

Famous clock at the Terry's chocolate factory in York ticks for the first time since 2005 after desperate hunt for its missing parts