Editing Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin (section)

===Apprentice clockmaker===
His penmanship was excellent, and it landed him a job as a clerk for an attorney's office. Instead of studying law, he tinkered with mechanical gadgets. His employer sent him back to his father. He was told that he was better suited as a watchmaker than a lawyer, but by then, Jean's father had already retired, so he became an apprentice to his cousin who had a watch-shop. For a short time, Jean-Eugène worked as a [[watchmaker]].<ref name="ref3"/>

In the mid-1820s, he saved up to buy a copy of a two-volume set of books on clockmaking called ''[[Traité de l'horlogerie]]'' ("Treatise on Clockmaking"), written by [[Ferdinand Berthoud]].<ref name="ref3"/> He would go on to pursue the craft of clockmaking for the rest of his life, and is widely credited with inventing the [[Mystery watch|mystery clock]].