Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rogers, Isaac
ROGERS, ISAAC (1754–1839), watchmaker, son of Isaac Rogers, Levant merchant and watchmaker, was born in White Hart Court, Gracechurch Street, on 13 Aug. 1754. His father did a good trade in watches in foreign markets, and a specimen of his work is in the British Museum. Educated at Dr. Milner's school, Peckham, the son was apprenticed, and in 1776 succeeded, to his father's business at 4 White Hart Court. On 2 Sept. 1776 he was admitted to the freedom of the Clockmakers' Company by patrimony, and on 11 Jan. 1790 became a liveryman, on 9 Oct. 1809 a member of the court of assistants, in 1823 warden, and on 29 Sept. 1824 master. In 1802 he moved his business to 24 Little Bell Alley, Coleman Street. He was also a member of the Levant Company, and carried on an extensive trade with Turkey, Smyrna, Philadelphia, and the West Indies. He designed and constructed two regulators—one with a mercurial pendulum, and the other with a gridiron pendulum. One of the projectors of a society for the improvement of naval architecture, he became treasurer of the society in 1799. He was much interested in the promotion of methods of lighting the streets with gas, and on the establishment of the Imperial Gas Company in 1818 was elected one of the directors and subsequently chairman of the board. In conjunction with Henry Clarke and George Atkins, he devised a permanent accumulation fund as a means of restoring the finances of the Clockmakers' Company. He died in December 1839. His portrait is in the company's collection in the Guildhall Library.
[E. J. Wood's Curiosities of Clocks and Watches, p. 348; Britten's Former Clock and Watch Makers, p. 372; Atkins and Overall's Account of the Company of Clockmakers, pp. 83, 88, 89, 143, 173, 185, 215, 282.]