Mr. David Wood
A period photograph of David Wood who is seated.
David Wood was born the son of John Wood (1727-1805) and Eunice (Fellows) Wood (1737-1801) in Newburyport, Massachusetts, on July 5, 1766. It is thought that he may have been apprenticed to either Daniel Balch Senior or to one of the members Mulliken family. All of whom were prominent Clockmakers in this region. David advertised in the Essex Journal and New Hampshire Packet on June 13, 1792, that he had set up a shop in Market Square, near Reverend Andrews Meeting House. Three short years later, he married Elizabeth Bird (1769-1846) of Newbury in 1795. It has become evident that David Wood was also a Retailer. In 1806 he advertised that he had for sale "Willard's best Patent Timepieces, for as low as can be purchased in Roxbury." In 1818, he and Abel Moulton, a local silversmith, moved into the shop formerly occupied by Thomas H. Balch. In 1824 he advertised that he had moved on the westerly side of Market Square opposite the Market House. After his wife's death in 1846, he moved to Lexington to live near his son David, who was a merchant in that town.
It has become quite obvious to us that David Wood was a very successful Clockmaker and Retailer of Clocks. Over the last 35 years of being in the business of selling clocks, we have sold many examples of wall, shelf, and tall case clocks bearing this Maker's signature on the dial.