In 1937, Glenn Beene moved in and went quietly about his work at his cozy watch repair shop at 115 E. Henderson St. in Cleburne.

He’d shared rent for a year at other locations, but this place was special — it was all his.

The building was only 6 feet wide with a front counter that measured 5 feet. He had to carefully turn sideways when he entered.

But all he needed was enough space to work.

Beene held time in his hands for 64 years, repairing watches for a while in his Joshua home after he retired in 2000. He and his wife, Erma, now reside in Cleburne.

He remembers playing with an old pocket watch when he was just a toddler. His family said he carefully guarded his treasured “hotch.”

“When I was in first grade at Mary’s Hill School near Joshua, boys would occasionally bring junker watches in their pockets,” Beene said. “I could always manage a trade of marbles or a top for one of them at recess.

“I could hardly wait to get the watch home and see what it looked like inside.”

When he was born in 1914, farming was primitive. By the time he was old enough to really work hard on the Joshua family farm, his parents, Allen Louis and Minnie Beene, sensed that Glenn’s interest lay elsewhere.

“Back then, we farmed by hand,” he said. “We didn’t have any equipment to speak of. When I was 12, Dad knew I wasn’t physically strong enough to be a good farmer, and that my real interest was in watches.

“Dad went to see Odie Riddle, a watch repairman in Joshua, and asked him to order the basic tools I needed.”

A year later, in 1927, Glenn’s father continued to encourage his son to develop his skill. He asked Walter Howard on East Henderson Street in Cleburne to show Glenn exactly what the job was like.

“Mr. Howard was very kind to me,” Beene recalled. “I was with him all summer. He had two work benches, and I sat at one. I watched everything he did very closely, and sometimes he would say, ‘I’m going over to the Woodmen Hall. You can clean this watch while I’m gone.’

“For a 13-year-old,” Beene continued, “that was very encouraging. Of course, he would check everything I did when he got back.”

Soon the summer ended and school began. Since Beene had to work in the cotton fields on the farm after school, his apprenticeship of sorts abruptly ended.

“From then on,” Beene recalled, “when we came in from the field for lunch while everyone else rested, I worked on watches.”

His confidence soared when he was 14. The First Assembly of God minister, O. B. Brawne, from Cleburne, trusted him to clean his railroad watch.

But he needed more equipment. In 1936, Beene bought a work bench, a lathe and more hand tools from Tony Bennenger, whose health had failed.

Beene started his own business in Cleburne on South Main Street, splitting rent with Homer Gentry, who had an appliance place. That was a big step for him — almost a gamble of sorts.

Soon afterwards, Gentry went out of business and Beene moved to East Chambers Street, in the building with Anderson Printing.

“He had a big front window and I worked there so everyone could see me from the street. That was common in those days — you didn’t advertise — you just let the people see you at work.”

Business grew, and Beene was eager to get out on his own. He rented a narrow building that had previously been a shoe store. Only 6 feet wide, located at 115 E. Henderson St., the place was wedged in between Stalcup Cleaners and Western Auto. His rent was $13 a month at first — later, $15. After the war, it jumped to $25.

There were five or six watch repairmen in Cleburne back then, he said, but there was a spirit of cooperation among them.

“We helped each other. If someone needed a part, we helped each other out. There wasn’t any feeling of competition. There was plenty of business for all of us,” he said.

At first, Beene worked on clocks, too, but soon all his work time was needed for watch repair.

He was gradually building a large inventory of crystals, springs and multiple watch parts.

Beene never hired an employee to work for him. He recalls coming in to this shop early in the mornings, crouching over his work bench, looking through his magnified eyepiece and never getting up unless a customer came in.

At lunchtime, he put a sign on the door, locked up, walked home — he lived only 10 minutes away on Brown Street — and enjoyed lunch with his wife, Erma. He returned to work and came home after dark.

Year after year.

Holidays were especially rewarding to him, but not for the typical reasons.

“I’d go to work and lock myself in with the ‘Out’ sign on the door. I could get so much more work done without interruptions.”

In the mid-1950s, Fay Burton was closing his jewelry store at 16 N. Caddo St. on the square. Beene moved his shop there, and bought Burton’s jewelry inventory.

“That was a mistake,” he admitted. “I would have to get up and wait on people, and I couldn’t get as much work done. I never did buy any more jewelry for that reason.”

Beene preferred a regular, predictable work schedule.

One day his regular routine was rudely interrupted. He recalls that he was at work at his bench when he heard a customer enter. As he looked up, just inches away a .45 revolver was pointed straight at his head.

“I could see right down the barrel — it was loaded. The man had his finger on the trigger. He just looked at me for a second and then asked, ‘Would you loan me some money on this gun?’”

Beene replied, “Let me see it.”

He quickly took the gun, unloaded it and broke it down. He told the intruder as he handed it back to him, “Did you know this thing was loaded? You don’t walk around Cleburne with a loaded gun.”

Looking confused, the man left.

Beene got back to work.

He retired and closed his shop in 1978, but continued to work on watches in his home until 2000.

But it wasn’t the same, he said. Quartz watches ended the need for the watch-repair craftsman. It costs more to repair a quartz watch than to buy a new one most of the time.

Most of his customers, therefore, were watch collectors. He could put a quartz movement inside an old pocket watch for them if they couldn’t remember to wind it. He had the old parts to restore them.

He and his wife, Erma, will observe their 68th wedding anniversary on Oct. 14. They have two sons, Gerald of South Lake; and Kenneth of Minneapolis. They have six grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren. The Beenes attend Bethel Temple Assembly of God Church in Cleburne.

Beene said all the years of close work have not damaged his eyesight — that at age 93, he recently passed his eye test for his driver’s license. Even though he spent so many years stooped over his workbench, he has little arthritic pain.

Beene has been invited to donate some of his equipment and memorabilia to the Layland Museum. Then others will know about the days that it took six watch repairmen working long hours in Cleburne to meet the demands of the trade.

“As I look back on it, I wouldn’t say that my work was always interesting. Sometimes it just had to be tolerated in order to make a living. The hours were long and the work was tedious.

“But,” he added proudly, “there is always pleasure in seeing a job well done.”

Dependable. Just like clockwork.

Larue Barnes’ newly published book, “They Were There:

World War II Veterans Remember World War II,” eye-witness

accounts of the war as told by

52 Johnson County veterans,

may be purchased by e-mailing

laruebarnes@yahoo.com

or by calling 817-645-9226.