Massive Clock Buried Inside A Texas Mountain Will Keep Ticking For 10,000 Years!

By - 676 words

Language

Reading Level

Listen to Article

Installation of the 10,000-year-old clock in Texas (Photo Credit: Longnow.org)

Future generations take note — deep inside the heart of a Sierra Diablo mountain, along the Texas-Mexico border, lies a 200-foot-tall, mechanical clock that ticks once a year, has a century hand that advances once every 100 years, and a cuckoo which will emerge once every 1000 years! Meet the 10,000 Year Clock!

Photo Credit: Longnow.org

The extraordinary timepiece is the brainchild of American inventor Danny Hillis, who first thought of the idea over 20 years ago in 1995. Since then, the engineer and his team have built several prototypes, including an 8-foot-tall version that helped usher in the year 2000, and is now on display at the London Science Museum.

However, it was not until 2011, when Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos agreed to fund the project’s $42 million cost that work on a full-scale version of the 10,000-year clock began in earnest. As you can imagine, designing a clock that can keep accurate time for such an extended period was no easy task. On February 20, 2018, Bezos announced that installation of the 500-foot-tall timepiece had finally begun.

Housed in a 500-foot-tall tunnel drilled inside a mountain owned by the billionaire, the clock will only be visible from the peak through a sapphire glass cupola that attaches it to the shaft. Made using durable, long-lasting materials like marine grade titanium, ceramic, and stone, the time machine will be driven by giant gears and powered by thermal energy harnessed from changes in the mountain’s day and night temperatures.

The timepiece’s bell will chime ten times a day, playing unique melodies that the inventors claim will never be repeated over the course of its 10,000-year lifespan. Unfortunately, given they will never emanate beyond the mountain’s walls, the countless musical scores will go unappreciated.

Photo Credit: Longnow.org

Five room-sized chambers carved inside the mountain will commemorate the clock’s one-year, ten-year, 100-year, 1000-year and 10,000-year anniversaries. At the end of the inaugural year, the first chamber will animate an 8-foot-tall model of the solar system. While Bezos and his team are seeking ideas to celebrate the clock’s ten-year anniversary, they will let future generations decide the best way to mark its 100-year, 1,000-year and 10,000-year birthdays.

However, the celebrations may never happen given that the remote mountain is far from any airport. Even if some brave souls do make it there, they will have to hike up a steep 1,500-foot hill to get to the double steel door entrance. They will then ascend in total darkness up a spiral stairway so steep, that it had to be constructed by a stone-slicing robot invented specifically for the job. Along the way, they will encounter massive stone disks the size of a car that act as counterweights to the clock’s drive system. Further up, will be the horizontal windlass that can be wound up manually to hear one of the clock’s thousands of unique chimes. However, thanks to its massive size, it will take two or three people to accomplish the task. Those who persevere all the way to the top will be handsomely rewarded with the clock’s 8-foot-wide face, which artistically depicts astronomical time with stars and planets.

Bezos says he hopes the clock will “change the way humanity thinks about time and encourage people to take a longer view of things.” The entrepreneur quips, “Over the lifetime of this clock, the United States won’t exist. Whole civilizations will rise and fall. New systems of government will be invented. You can’t imagine the world — no one can — that we’re trying to get this clock to pass through.”

The face of the 10,000-year-old clock (Photo Credit: Longnow.org)

It turns out Bezos is not the only one who thinks the 10,000 Year Clock is a brilliant way to connect us with future generations. Hillis expects to build many more and says his non-profit, The Long Now, has already garnered funding for a second one, which will be housed inside a mountain in eastern Nevada’s Great Basin National Park.

Resources: longnow.org. wired.com

Workbook

Get the Workbook for this article!

Workbook contains: Article, Reading Comprehension, Critical Thinking Questions, Vocabulary in Context (+ answers), Multiple Choice Quiz (+ answers), Parts of Speech Quiz (+ answers), Vocabulary Game (+ answers)
Cite Article
Learn Keywords in this Article
289 Comments
  • sorenover 5 years
    that is awesome
    • Elisabethover 5 years
      Thank you for that article. That is so crazy and amazing at the same time. I love how someone can even have a thought like that . Thank you again I might even say this was my favorite article yet.
      • Liahmover 5 years
        but that is kind of cool. just think about how smart of engineers those people have to be
        • ellaover 5 years
          that article was very interesting I've never seen something like that. that was so weird and fascinating also crazy cool thank you for sharing this article!!
          • Liahmover 5 years
            I agree with wolfdog i don't think that clock will last 10,000 years probably if the clock dose not get taken good care of the clock will run out of fuel
            • Kolten over 5 years
              this article is very about the clock in texas this guy is making a clock that will last for 10,000 years
              • wolfdog
                wolfdogover 5 years
                sometimes I wish I was immortal.
                • wolfdog
                  wolfdogover 5 years
                  I don't think it'll tick for 10,000 years, without regular monitoring. Most it'll go without management= 40-50. Probably 70 years.
                  • DJ Yonderover 5 years
                    Creepy! LOL
                    • DJ Yonderover 5 years
                      That is Wierd