Wall clock from the Time-Life offices in Houston, Texas

Donor Rose Blatch was secretary of the Time-Life bureau in Dallas (1961-62) and Houston (1963-72). Among the mementos she saved from her career with Time-Life was this clock that was hanging in the Houston bureau office at the time of the assassination.  As Rose explained in an oral history recorded in 2012, this clock was connected to the office's Western Union teletype machines, and a small light (visible above the number "6") would flash when news came across the wire. - Stephen Fagin, Associate Curator 

Most broadcast and print newsrooms, as well as banks and other businesses, subscribed to the Western Union telegrpah service in order to have extremely accurate time references.  Daily time signals originated with the U.S. Naval Observatory and were passed along the line to subscribers who had their clocks connected to them. - Gary Mack, Curator.