Perhaps your clock man was just a very slow learner <g> I would agree that the norm was 7 years, I have heard of shorter, three or five years but not longer than seven Nivard Ovington in Cornwall (UK) Normally I would have agreed with you June, but yesterday I had the horologist in to estimate for repairing my long case clock. He was telling me that the length of an apprenticeship for his profession was 10 years! Maybe the time varied with the profession. Chris