By Alexei Summers (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: July 4, 2012
If you were a young child in Abbotsford in the 1990s you might recall a certain water clock that was located in the Sevenoaks mall. The clock was tall, and had coloured dye in it. It conveyed very accurate time, and was a popular location where people would sit and relax after a long day spent in the mall. Children would frolic around it and toss coins in the fountain, hoping their wishes would be granted.
Today, the place where the Abbotsford Clepsydra clock once was has since been repurposed to be the area where Santa has his little visits with the children every Christmas, as well as a sitting area, where several comfortable couches and benches have been installed in its place.
But what happened to the water clock? This is a question that many Abbotsford residents have been asking themselves for years – the answer to which is right under their very noses.
As it turns out, the water clock is safe and sound in the city of Abbotsford. It was donated by Sevenoaks mall to the Abbotsford airport in the year 2000. Many travellers pass the clock, either not recognizing or remembering it, due the years of it being out of the public eye and having forgotten what it looked like.
“I didn’t want to see the clock leave Abbotsford,” said Sevenoaks operations manager Rick Reid, who remembers the clock’s purchase in 1991, and its later donation. “I didn’t want it to be sold. Instead it was donated. It’s an important historical landmark to the city.”
The clock has an interesting history that spans back to its creation in France. It was designed by a French scientist and doctor named Bernard Gitton. Gitton created around 21 similar “sister” water clocks. The clock that belongs to Abbotsford was originally located in a shopping centre in Paris, France and was eventually purchased by Sevenoaks mall. It was then installed in the October of 1991, where it remained for the duration of the decade until the millennium approached, at which point it was donated to the city, who relocated it to the airport.
“The reason for the donation was this,” Reid said, “it was becoming very costly to maintain. The dye was very troublesome, and also kids would throw coins in it a lot, damaging it.”
There are only two of Dr. Gitton’s water clocks in the entirety of the continent. The other clocks are scattered throughout the rest of the globe, but only two of his creations exist in North America – one of those being right here, in Abbotsford, BC, and the other is located in the southern United States.
Today Bernard Gitton’s Clepsydra clock may now be seen by all who wander through the Abbotsford International Airport, a symbol of Abbotsford’s rich history.
