Philander Jacob Willard of Ashburnham, Massachusetts

Philander Jacob Willard was a direct descendant of Col. Simon Willard (1605-1676), a co-founder of Concord, Massachusetts in 1637. Col. Willard had three wives who bore him seventeen children. The descendants of which made the Ashby / Ashburnham Willard families relatives of the Grafton / Boston Willard clockmaking families. 

Philander Jacob Willard was the first son of an Ashburnham, Massachusetts farmer, Jacob Willard (b. July 20, 1734, in Harvard, MA and died in -1808 in Ashburnham), and Rhoda Randall of Stow, Massachusetts. Philander was born in Ashburnham on September 29, 1772. He had one younger brother, Alexander Willard, also a clockmaker. It is now thought that he served his clockmaking apprenticeship with the Edwards Brothers of Ashby. He worked in Ashburnham as a clockmaker as early as 1793 and moved to Ashby sometime after 1825. He died there on December 26, 1840. Clockmaking material was listed in his probate inventory.

Currently, clocks found signed Philander Willard, J. Willard, and Jacob Willard are all associated to have been made by this Maker.