--- title: Rare Clock Smashed By Museum Visitor Trying to Make It Tick description: A visitor to the National Clock & Watch Museum gets too hands-on with a priceless clock — and here's the video of it crashing down. canonical: https://time.com/4357247/national-clock-and-watch-museum-broken/ author: Raisa Bruner article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-06-03T21:44:24.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:32:59.313Z og:title: Museum Visitor Wanted to Make Priceless Clock Tick. It Got Smashed og:description: He probably wishes he could turn back time og:url: https://time.com/4357247/national-clock-and-watch-museum-broken/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Museum Visitor Wanted to Make Priceless Clock Tick. It Got Smashed twitter:description: He probably wishes he could turn back time twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # A Museum Visitor Wanted to Make This Priceless Clock Tick. It Got Smashed Instead > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-brief-2026q3/newsletters?i=239b74e7-0a2f-4777-b185-3c4882041661&cr=time-nl-brief-2026q3-v1)  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Jun 3, 2016 9:44 PM UTC  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Jun 3, 2016 9:44 PM UTC Earlier this week, a visitor to the National Clock and Watch Museum in Columbia, Pa., [got a little too hands-on with one of the priceless timepieces on display](http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Clock-Museum-Lancaster-PA-Touch-Knock-Off-Wall-Broken-381645501.html). In footage caught on surveillance camera, you can see the man fiddling with a one-of-a-kind hanging wooden wall clock while his companion looks on. Unfortunately, the clock comes smashing down, breaking into pieces. When an attempt to re-hang the clock fails, the couple disperses. Museum director Noel Poirier told [NBC Philadelphia](http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Clock-Museum-Lancaster-PA-Touch-Knock-Off-Wall-Broken-381645501.html) that the man then approached a museum staffer for help. “For us, it’s a learning opportunity for folks because there are reasons that museums ask folks not to touch things,” Poirier said. The museum decided to share the video on its YouTube and Instagram accounts—as a warning, and as a reminder. Since then, the footage has been uploaded to YouTube over a dozen times and racked up over half a million views (and counting). With any luck, this will help us all remember that some rules are really _not_ meant to be broken. 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