In 1814, being twenty-one years of age and his own master, he set up a carpenter shop of his own, being not yet sufficiently master of clock-making to undertake that on his own account.  In 1815, he married.  Times were hard.  The war with England had just ended, and labor was poorly compensated.  He is said at this time to have “finished the whole interior of a three-story house, including twenty-seven doors and an oak floor, nothing being found for him but the timber,” for the beggarly sum of eighty-seven dollars—­a task which no builder would undertake to-day for less than a thousand dollars.  Still, he declared that, in spite of this poor rate of compensation, he was enabled to save enough to make a partial payment on a small dwelling for himself.  It required a constant struggle, however, to live at this rate, and in the winter of 1816, being out of work, and having a payment on his house to meet in the spring, he determined to go to Baltimore to seek work during the winter.  He was on the eve of starting, when he learned that Mr. Eli Terry, the inventor of the wooden clocks which were so popular fifty years ago, was about to open a large factory for them in an adjoining town.  He walked to the town, and made his application to Mr. Terry, who at once engaged him at liberal wages.  Mr. Terry’s factory was then the largest in the country, and, as he used wooden instead of metal works, he was able to manufacture his best clocks at fifteen dollars, and other grades in proportion.  This reduction in price largely increased the sale of his clocks, and in a comparatively short time after opening his factory, Mr. Terry made and sold about six thousand clocks a year.

Jerome was determined that he would spare no pains to make himself master of every detail of clock-making, and applied himself to the business with so much intelligence and energy, that by the spring of 1817 he felt himself competent to undertake their manufacture on his own account.  He began his operations very cautiously, at first buying the works already made, putting them together, and making the cases himself.  When he had finished two or three, he would carry them about for sale, and as his work was well done, he rarely had any difficulty in disposing of them.  Gradually he increased his business, and in a year or two was able to sell every clock he could make, which kept him constantly busy.  A Southern dealer having seen one of his clocks, was so well pleased with it that he gave the maker an order for twelve exactly like it, which the latter agreed to furnish at twelve dollars each.  It was an enormous order to Jerome, and seemed to him almost too good to be real.  He completed the clocks at the stipulated time, and conveyed them in a farmer’s wagon to the place where the purchaser had agreed to receive them.  The money was paid to him in silver, and as the broad pieces were counted into his hand, he was almost ready to weep for joy.  One hundred and forty-four dollars was the largest sum he had ever possessed at one time, and it seemed almost a fortune to him.  His clocks were taken to Charleston, South Carolina, and sold.  They gave entire satisfaction; and when, some years later, he commenced to ship regular consignments to the Southern cities, he found no difficulty in disposing of his wares.