There is a poem, often attributed to 20th century theologian Robert H.Smith, that begins, “the clock of life is wound but once/ and no man has the power/ to tell just when the hands will stop/ at late or early hour.” When the hands of Gilles Daigneault’s “clock of life” came to a stop, it was a surprise to his whole family, and one that left them with an unexpected legacy. Daigneault, a former Sherbrooke Optometrist, collected close to 400 clocks over the course of his life out of a love and passion for restoring their inner workings. “When he died in 1990, it was the biggest collection in Canada,” said Dominique Daigneault, one of Gilles’ two daughters, explaining that her father had a dream of one day opening a museum to share his collection and passion with others, but that the dream went up in smoke the day he died. She said that the family, “lived in clocks,” when she and her sister Manon were growing up, with clocks on every wall of the house except in the bathroom. See full story in the Friday, October 26 edition of The Record.
Daigneault auction a rare opportunity for those looking to buy a little time
By Gordon Lambie
