History of Watch Making and Collecting
Collecting of Fine Watches is a passion with a very long an interesting history. Man has always been obsessed with time. Imagine how early man conceived the passage of time. Before the calendar, life was measured by the heavens, the position of the stars in the sky, the fullness of the moon. The cycles of life were closely intertwined with the passage of time. No wonder watches hold a certain fascination, as if a way to "hold onto time."
Charles V of France, for
instance, who died in 1380, ordered from Henri le Vic of Lorraine, the clock called
L'horloge du Palais in Paris, and also other clocks for his houses, Beaute, Hesdin,
Plessis de Parc, Vincennes and Monchateaux of Mehun-syr-Yevres, Nonette and Lusignan.
In an interesting essay published in 1966. it is described that the clock-building
industry in Belgium at the time of the Dukes of Burgundy "The sons of Jean le Bon
were by tradition interested in mechanical curiosities. Charles V was a collector of all
kinds of instruments for measuring time, including clocks. Philip the bold, seeing his
nephew, Charles VI, set fire to the Belgian town of Courtrai, seized the opportunity to
carry off the clock from the Market Hall with its bell-tower and automata to his capital,
Dijon. The third Duke of Burgandu, Philip the Good, seems to have had a great interest in
automata; it is said that his banquets in the chateau de Hesdin were famous for the
strange chimeras that walked across the table moving jaws and tails, while Diana's of
silver and precious stones drew their bows, to the wonder and amazement of the guests. To
be the owner of such objects at that time, perhaps a hundred years after the appearance of
the first monumental clocks, was a sounds of great pride.
The day inevitably came
when nobleman, rich monasteries, and cities were no longer alone in wanting a clock.
Several very skilled craftsmen, in pursuit of the passion for things miniature, started to
make smaller iron clocks for interiors such as halls or anterooms, and the fusion soon
spread.
The first wall clocks probably came from Italy, and though still in the Gothic period,
were furnished with an alarm and perhaps an hourly chime. The art of making them passed
along two distant courses, one through France, Burgundy and Flanders and the other along
the Danube as far as Augsburg, a city which became one of the most important cock making
centers in the words in the sixteenth century,
At first chamber clocks were the prerogative of noblemen, but later were kept by rich
bankers and merchants and the bourgeoisie. The earliest ones were used in monasteries and
convents where they told the hours of the office. They may even have been invented by as
monk with a talent for clock making.
Bassermann-Jordan, the German author and collector, found and published the following
document dated 1511: "In Nuremberg Henlein is renowned for very small clock which
will go for forty hours either in the pocket or worn on a chain." This is
considered the first portable personal timekeeper using a small coiled spring- much as he
used in his locks- and a scaled-down train of gears. They called it the
"Nuremberg Egg."
This timekeeper, now called a "watch" inspired craftsmen all over Europe, especially in Geneva, where a flood of refugees from France and Germany, many of whom were watch and clock makers, were fleeing religious persecution and sought refuge in the free city, to whose inhabitants they taught their craft.
Another earlier German
historian, Chochlaaues, in a supplement to the Cosmography of Pomponius Mela, described
the Nuremberg artists: "Every day they invent new and more refined pieces. For
instance, Peter Hele, who is still a young man and whose work is the admiration of
scholars and mathematician, can make a watch from a small piece of iron and furnished with
many wheels. This kind of clocks goes, whatever its positions, without weights for forty
hours, it tells the time and chimes on the hour whether it is carried in the pocket or
worn as a pendant.
The following extract comes from a manuscript in the Bibliotheque Nationale written by
Jean Sapin, Receiver General of the Languedeoc. It is dated the last day of December 1518.
"To Julien Coudray, Master Clockmaker if Blois, paid the sum of two hundred gold ecus
for two excellent daggers, each set with a watch, all gilder, in the hand, ordered by the
kind for his own use."
However, Professor Morpurgo, working among archives in Italy was fortunate to discover
document which prove the Pietro Guido of Mantua, known to have been a very skilful small
clockmaker, constructed pocket watches for 1500. A letter dates 7 May 1506, sent by Doctor
Bernardus Bembo to Her highness the marquise Isabella of Gonzagues, mentions "small
clocks and very tiny ones constructed by Pietro Guido and sent for repair."
There are few collections containing watches that can be definitely dated to the early
sixteenth century, but after that date they were made and sold widely in many countries of
western Europe, l great museums of Europe and America and many private collections possess
watches of this period, and the movement usually signed with the name of the maker.
There were watchmakers in many French towns: they are recorded at Paris, Lyon, Blois,
Strasbourg, Dijon, Rouen, La Rochelle and Metz, in Germany at Nuremberg, Augsburg, Cologne
and Bremen; in Switzerland at Geneva, Zug and Basle and also in London, Amsterdam,
Brussels and the Hague. At different times, the chief watch making centers were Paris,
Lyons, Blois, London and Geneva.
In 1953 Professor Morpurgo found a remarkably interesting document: a letter from the
assistant bishop of Mantua, Comino da Pontevico (a man who was interested in clocks and
owned a laboratory) to Marquis of Mantua, written on 21st August 1482. The following
passage is an extract:
"The clock has a
steel spring concealed in a brass cylinder, round which is wound a cat-gut chord, as to
make it (the spring) invisible; and if this steel spring were not there, despite the cord,
the machine would not work. The cord s tied to the cylinder, united with t the steel
spring so as to provoke the pull of the thread (fusee) to which it is fixed, this movement
of the thread sets all the wheels of the clock in motion. Such are the clocks which I have
shown Your Grace; all the masters who make clocks without weights use this method and
several examples are to be seen here in Mantua."
In any collections of early timepieces, Renaissance clocks and watches must always, in our
view, take pride of place. However, it is not on account of their accuracy that these
pieces merit so much attention because at that date an oscillator capable of producing a
regular and invariable unit of time was unknown.
It is the ingenious mechanism that gives sixteenth and seventeenth century clocks their
interest, together with their fine shape and beautifully decorated cases, and the fact
that they are hand made, that every piece had been filed and fitted unto a particular
style. When that piece was also one of the principal parts of the clock or watch, it had a
precise mechanical function similar to the parts of the human body. It is the combination
of these different functions which constitutes the marvelous little living mechanism we
have in a clock or a watch.
The clockmaker artists who made these masterpieces were so conscientious and so absorbed
in their work that they took as much care over the quality of the working parts as they
did over the beauty of the form. Decoration was not limited to the external parts of he
instrument, the case, the dial and the hands, but was applied to several parts of the
movement. The movement of every clock or watch from the fifteenth to the seventeen century
and even into the beginning of the eighteenth comprises two plates linked by pillars. The
decorated parts of the pillars, the cock, which serves as a bracket for the foliot or
which covers the balance wheel, several coquerets which belong to the regulator or the
movement and for, very fine pieces, the outside of the drum case. Ornamental motives were
generally flowering scrolls and arabesques.
From the early seventeenth century the profession of the clockmaker was graced by a number
of Master Horologists in Germany, especially in the regions of Augsburg and Dresden, in
England in London, in France at Blois, Lyons and Paris and in Switzerland in Geneva.
Usually they came from families of substance or from generations of craftsmen. They
constituted groups of highly skilled workers, even with a certain degree of culture
acquired through their commercial and scientific contacts with noblemen and scholars, and
of a social standing which put them in the highest ranks of craftsmen.
In the seventeenth century, watches were generally made of silver, copper, girl or carved
from rock crystal or topaz, rarely of fold. Such was the taste of the period that beauty
of workman ship preferred to costly materials.
Dials were decorated with rich engraving, Etienne Delaulne one of the most famous French
Decorators of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, published several
collections of engraved designs of decoration of Delaulne prints representing watch-cases
was sold for 10,000 Francs in Paris in June 1914. These collections were kept in the
studios of Masters Goldsmiths and clock makers, who sometimes also made their watch cases
themselves. Among the rarer materials used amethyst, cornelian, ivory, and amber cared in
relief of in intaglio.
The Beginning of
the Pocket Watch
The development of the clock
during the renaissance can be looked as a journey
towards miniaturization. At the end of which the clock emerged in the form of the
pocket watch.
1500- In Germany, the invention of the stackfreed regulated the power of the spring by
giving it a breaking affect.
1500- Leonardo Da Vinci
discovers the fusse which consists of a drum with a spiral track cut in the form of a come
on which at cat-gut cord or fine chain in wound.
Stockfreed replaced by the Fusse
1515- marked the initial appearance of pocket
watches in Germany and France.
In 1530, the stockfreed was replaced by the fusse.
In 1540, the Fusse method was adapted for pocket watches. The form of the
movement was modified and given a more ovular and deeper shape.
In 1550, the foliot escapement was replaced by a circular balance formed by a metal pin 
attached to
the verge of the escapement by spoke and wheels.
In 1578, Julian
Coudray master clockmaker of Blois, mad Daggers with a watch, all
gilded in the handle ordered by the king in 1506.
In 1587, Britten, an English Horologist illustrated the first fine renaissance clock with
a minute hand on the same axis as the hour hand.
In 1650, Gruet, a Genevan Clockmaker invented a samll chain of steel links and applied to
the fusse thus making the first chain-driven fusse.
In 1673, Christian Huygens described the minute mechanism of two
pinions and two wheels in his famous work, Horologium Oscillatorium, but does not claim to
have been to inventor.
In 1675, Christian Huygens discovers the oscillator.
In 1676, Barlow and Quane invented the first repeater chime which enabled a person to tell
time in the dark. The watch sounds the hour and the quarters that have past every time a
lever in the pendant is pressed.
James Cox made a musical
as well as automatic clock. One of his masterpieces is the peacock clock, now in the
museum of Leningrad. It is said to have been to taken to Saint Petersburg in 1777 by the
duchess of Kingston.
In 1691 Daniel Quave (1648-1724), adapted a small train of wheels to the match and added a
minute hand to the hour hand.
In 1706 Daniel Jean Richard (1665-1741) opened the first workshop in Switzerland. In 1714,
A Yorkshire clock maker named, Jeremy Thacker, described a spring for keeping the clock
going while it was being wound and maintaining power.
1741- Nicholas Fardoil, a French clockmaker, invents the first machine for dividing and
cutting wheels.
In 1744, William Blakey, an English Clockmaker, presented a tool for cutting pinions in
Paris.
John Harrison (1693-1776) made a clock, which incorporated an original escapement, and
bearing that eliminated the need for oil and reduced friction to a minimum. These
timepieces were so precise, they could keep time accurate to within one second a month.
Enameled Watches
In 1630, a goldsmith from
Chateaudun Jean Toutin perfected a method of painting with polychrome enamel. The piece to
be decorated was first covered with a layer of opaque with enamel and fire, then required
colors we painted on with a fine brush and whole fire at once.
In 1650, Petitot born in Geneva became a portraitist of enamel of great Renown.
In 1650, Jacques Vauquer of Blois made a Collection of prints which were used as models by
painters engravers and decorators of the period.
In 1671, a talented miniaturist Pierre Huant of Chatellerault who left France fifty years
before took Jean Toutin a marvelous craftsman to Berlin and Prussia.
In 1685, many French craftsmen emigrated after the revocation of the edict of Nantes, and
settled in Switzerland, and enrolled in the Splendid Clock maker corporation of Blois some
of the names are:
Clockmakers of Lyons,
Blois and Geneva
Louis Arthaud
(1612-1662)
Hugues Combret (1619-1669)
Pierre Combret (1570-1622)
Claude du Cleron (1594-1637)
(Zacharie?) Formereau after 1626
Pierre Louteau (1603-1628)
Guillaume Nourisson (1655-1700)
Christophe and Pierre Noytolon 1558-1607 and 1610-1630
Abel Senebier (1638-1640)
Jean Vallier (1596-1649)
Salomon Chesnon
Guillaume Coudray
Julien Coudray (1504-1551)
Cuper
Abraham de la Garde
Jacques de la Garde 1551
Nicolas and Abraham Gribelin
Jean du Jardin
Nicolas and Louis Le Maindre
Jehan Naze (1554-1581)
Piron
Vaultier
Antoine Arlaud, became a citizen of Geneva in 1617
Henry Arlaud (1631-1689)
Charles Bobinet (1610-1678)
Denis Bordier (1629-1708)
Jean-Baptiste Duboule (1615-1694)
Martin Duboule (1583-1639)
Pierre Duhamel (1630-1686)
David Rousseau (1641-1738)
Jean Rousseau (1606-1684) great-grandfather of Jean-Jacques
Jacques Sermand (1595-1651)
Jacques Sermand (nephew) 1636-1667
Evolution of the Watch
At the beginning of the
18th century, Clock makers had appreciated the improvement in precision and soon realized
that great precision could only be achieved by eliminating all causes of disturbance in
the impulse of the two types of oscillators.
Successive inventions perfected those parts regulating and counting the period of the
oscillators. Wheel pivots, moved in holes pierced through the plates. These holes
gradually filled with Verdigris from the oil used to prevent friction and after a while, a
sticky deposit was formed which increased frictional resistance and sometimes even stopped
the watch!
Ruby Jewels
In 1700, Nicolas Fatio, born at Basle, Switzerland in 1664, discovered how to pierce and
fashion precious stones. He went to England and obtained a patent for his discovery in May
1, 1704.
In 1704, French
clockmakers Pierre and Thomas Debautree started to make watches with Pierce Jewel.
At first, jewels were only set in the balance staff and the pivots of the escapement
wheel. But subsequently , in the other pivot points of the moving parts; until 1770
English watchmaker alone benefited from these movements because watch jewels was kept
secret.
In 1771, Pierre le Roy, a French Clockmaker (1717-1785) acknowledged the need for pierced
rubies in a memorandum.
In 1766, Ferdinand Berthoud was sent to England by the Duc De Praslin, French minister of the marine, to make a marine chronometer. On November 3rd Ferdinand Berthoud sent two marine clocks to the French Navy to be tested at sea. The comprised the use of hardstones on the moving surfaces of the cylinder escapement.
This was the first two
watches set with Jewels to be made in the country.
In 1796, Abraham Louis Bregeut (1744-1823) because of his friendly relationship with
English watchmakers was able to acquire pierce stones from England as well as other parts
with hardstones. By this means his Paris workshop produced in 1796, his famous suscription
watches with Ruby Cylinder Escapement.
In 1823, Pierre Frederie, Jewel Specialist of the house of Breguet returned to his
birthplace, 22 Chaux de Fonds in Switzerland to make stones for commercial sale.
Escapements
Another invention much more important the pierced stones appeared in about 1710, and it
was the replacement of the verge by other escapements capable of maintain and counting the
oscillations of balance spring watches. Several types of escapements were invented apart
from the few escapements still in use today there were numerous others while have since
disappeared. Escapement can be classified in three categories.
1. Recoil Escapement- In these an organ dependent on the oscillator
describes a recoil from the crown-wheel at the moment of hesitation in the train. This
kind produced the greatest disturbance on the period of oscillation. The verge or
crown-wheel escapement is one of these.
2. Frictional Rest Escapement-
Here the balance is constantly in
contact with the escape-wheel without forcing a recoil at the moment of hesitation in the
train. This type of escapement causes much less disturbance in the period of oscillation.
3. Detached Escapement- This type of movement is characterized by the interposition of a piece between the escape-wheel and oscillator. The escapement wheel is held immobile against this piece at the period of hesitation in the train. Except at the very brief moment of impulse the balance moves without any contact with the escapement. Detached escapements cause the least disturbance to the oscillation period and are mechanically the best. Watches and chronometers with this kind of movement have a large, heavy balance-wheel (with a large moment of inertia) coupled with a spiral spring. All these changes moved towards precision.
In 1695, William Hougtom
(1636-1713) patented the first cylinder escapement which was attributed to George Graham.
In 1700, Edward Barlow (1636 - 1716) started to make watches with simple cylinder
escapements.
Thomas Tompion (???????), George Graham's uncle, produced pocket watches with cylinder
wheel escapements.
Jean Andre Lepaute (1720-1789) a French clock maker in vented the virgule escapement.
These frictional rest escapements were very successful in the second half of the
eighteenth century.
In 1756, Pierre Le Roy invented the duplex escapement which was also very successful.
In 1748, Pierre Le Roy
demonstrated to the Academies of Science in Paris, the first detached escapement.
In 1754, Thomas Mudge (1715 - 1794), an English Clockmaker invented the first lever
escapement. It compromised of four pieces, the wheel, the anchor, the fork, and the
balance staff.
In 1782, Swiss Clockmaker, Josiah Emery (1725 - 1796), made several modifications to the
lever escapement to acquire its form with only three pieces.
In 1790, Abraham Louis
Breguet used a bimetallic strip, curved and bent, with two parallel U-shaped arms fixed to
a short end of the regulator index. A salient piece attached to the end of the interior
segment of the strip serves as appoint of rest for the spring as it expands, whilst a pin
inserted in the same arm of the index fulfilled the same function when the spiral
contracted. In cold conditions these two supporting parts were very close to one another
the active part of the spiral was the shortest and resulting the period of oscillation
being diminished. In warm conditions the support of the bimetallic strip was withdrawn
forum the pin of the index so that the active length of the spiral was augmented.
In 1795, Jean Romillu of Geneva (1714 - 1796) was the advocate of the eight-day watch,
constructing several examples, one of which had a cylinder escapement and a very large
balance giving one alternation per second (two alternations equal to one oscillation). He
also constructed watches showing the equation of time, and a repeated second-watch which
went for 378 days without being wound, which he presented to the Academy Royal of Sciences
in 1758.
In 1775, Jean Antoine Lepine (1720 - 1814) invented the watch movement with no fusee and
with bars or bridges instead of pillars AND UPPER PLATES. This arrangement allowed the
balance to be set on one side instead of on top of the mainspring, wheels and escapement
and produced a much flatter watch. Lepine also claimed the invention of the virgule
escapement. The term Lepin caliber has been in use ever since to describe a watch movement
in which the arrangement and dimensions of different parts of the movements, the bridges,
the origin of the watch, or the name of its constructor.
In 1798. Antoine Tavan (1749 - 1836), a French Watch maker was one of the most
distinguished watchmakers of Geneva. An expert on escapements, he made a collection of 12
different kinds which are now in the museum of Horlogerie in Geneva. In 1808 he presented
to the Geneva Society of Arts a watch with a 'second beat", that is with two sets of
gears.
In 1816, the Society of
Arts instituted a competition for the regulating of clocks and watches at the Observatory
in Geneva.
"A prize of 800 florins is offered to the man who can exhibit a watch the variations
of which do not exceed three seconds in twenty-four hours, whether it be placed on a flat
surface, suspended, or worn, and this must be observed in a temperature above 25 in the
Reaumer scale.
Antoine Tavan won the competition.
The Great Watchmakers of Western Europe
There was intense competition between all the great watchmakers of western Europe. Whilst
the English craftsmen were chiefly preoccupied with improving the precision of marine and
pocket watches, in France and Switzerland interest was centered on research on practical
additions, as well as on new types of watches. This period is also characterized by the
fact that English clockmakers, foremost until that time, were now overtaken on some points
by French and Swiss designers.
ENGLISH WATCHMAKERS
George Graham
(1673-1751)
John Harrison (1693 - 1776)
Thomas Mudge (1715-1794)
Josiah Emery (1725 - 1796)
John Ellicott (1706-1772)
John Arnold (1736-1799)
Thomas Earnshaw (1749-1829)
William Frodsham (1778-1850)
Edward John Dent (1790-1853)
James Ferguson Cole (1798-1880)
Charles Frodsham (1810-1871)
Aaron L. Dennison 1812-1895 (American by birth)
Edward Howard 1813-1904 (American by birth)
FRENCH WATCH MAKERS
Pierre Le Roy (1717-
1785)
Ferdinand Berthoud (1725 - 1807)
P. A. Caron de Beaumarchais Jean Antoine Lepine (1720 - 1814)
A.L. Breguet (1744-1823)
Jean Andre Lepaute (1720-1789)
Antide Janvier (1751-1835)
Louis Moinet (1786-1853)
Joseph Winner1 1799-1886 (Austrian by birth)
SWISS WATCH MAKERS
Jean Romilly (1714 -
1796)
Antoine Tavan (1749 - 1836)
Pierre Jaquet-Droz (1721-1790)
Abraham Louis Perrelet (1729-1820)
Jacques Frederic Houriet (1743-1830)
Jean Frederic Leschot (1746-1824)
Henry Louis Jaquet-Droz (1752-1791)
Jean Moise Pouzait (1753-1793)
Frederic Louis Favre-Bulle (1770-1849)
Jean Francois Bautte (1772-1845)
Urban Jurgensen 1776-1830 (Danish by birth)
Louis Benjamin Audemars (1782-1833)
Pierre Frederic Ingold (1787-1878)
Georges Auguste Leschot (1800-1884)
Jean Celamis Lutz (1800-1863)
Antoine Le Coultre (1803-1881)
Henry Grandjean (1803-1879)
Sylvain Mairet (1805-1890)
Jules Jurgensen (1808-1877)
Antoine Lechaud (1812-1875)
Louis Richard (1812-1895)
WATCHMAKERS FROM OTHER COUNTRIES
Heinrich Johannes
Kessels 1781-1848 (Germany)
Adolf Ferdinand Lange 1815-1875 (Germany)
Charles Fasold 1818-1898 (Germany)
Karl Moritz Grossmann 1826-1885 (Germany)
Henri Robert Ekegren 1823-1896 (Sweden)
Victor Kullberg 1824-1890 (Sweden)
Lyman W. Tompson 1825-1910 (U.S.A.)
Edward Koehn Snr. 1839-1908 (U.S.A.)
OTHER IMPORTANT
EVENTS IN THE HISTORY OF WATCH MAKING
In 1768, Jacques Frederic Houriet spent nine years in Paris working in the studios of
Julien Le Roy Watchmaker Royal; he became friendly with his compatriots Berthoud and
Breguet and then returned to Switzerland to found a watch making business at Le Locle. He
is usually considered to be the founder of the watch making industry of the Jura near
Neufchatel.
In 1770, Abraham Louis Perrelet at Le Locle invented the so-called perpetual watch which
is wound b the movement of the wearer, the forerunner of the present day automatic
wrist-watch.
In 1780, A.L. Breguet, working in Paris, perfected the perpetual watch and invented an
escapement with constant motive power, which has the ability to restore to the oscillator,
at every oscillation, an exact and unchanging quantity of energy whatever the quantity and
variation in the motive power. He also invented several other additions and improved of
which the following are the most important.
1. Improvement of the
ruby cylinder escapement (invented by Arnold) in 1790.
2. Perpetual Calendar in 1795
3. Tourbillion in 1795
4. Repeating chimes in 1795.
5. Sympathetic clock which reset itself in 1795
6. Watch to be read by touch 1796-1800
7. Sympathetic clocks which reset and rewound a watch 1805-1810.
A.L. Breguet was also the inventor of the parachute which is the first form of a device for protecting the staff pivots of the balance against shock. He was the first to construct float and extra flat watches. Breguiet is considered to be the greatest watchmaker of all time. White his competitors and contemporaries he reached the heights of complicated work.
The Marine Chronometer
Until the middle of the
seventeenth century, that is for a period of almost 250 years, the economic repercussion
of the Genoese, Portuguese and Spanish discoverers were relatively limited. Only three or
four great ocean routes were still so dangerous that ships driven off their intended
course along the coasts and islands were often lost. The unsatisfactory means of fining
positions at whilst pirates on watch for vessels in distress only added to the dangers.
It was essential for navigation to establish the exact position of island and continents
and to draw accurate charts of their coasts, It was also necessary to find a means for
navigation to determine the geographical position of their ship accurately by day or
night.
The fundamental technical problem was how to determine the geographical coordinates of a
given place. The coordinates are the latitude, that is the angular height above or below
the equator, and the longitude, or angular distance between the meridian on which the
observer is standing and that of standard meridian such as Greenwich (Longitude 0)
The latitude of a place is calculated at night by the height of the pole star above the
horizon and, by day, by the same angular height of t of the sun as it passes over the
meridian. Other means of calculating the altitude of a place measure the angular high of
different stars above the horizon where the pole star is not visible or the sun hidden by
clouds. These methods had been known since antiquity, and in the sixteenth century the
astrolabe was accurate enough to calculate the latitude.
To determine the longitude is more difficult. Until mid-eighteenth century sailors
proceeded by estimation alone. Astronomical phenomena were the only guides: conjunctions
of starts and eclipses of Jupiter's satellites. Over the centuries Greek, Roman and other
astronomers had tried to calculate these astronomical events more exactly and by 1500 they
could be predicted to within an hour. But in determining the longitude of a place a
difference of an hour constitutes an error of about one thousand miles, the distance, say,
from Paris to Stockholm, and is completely useless for purposes of navigation.
In 1598 Philip the
third, king of Spain offered the reward of 100,000 escudos to any one who could make a
precise timekeeper to be used in navigational calculations.
In 1714, the English Parliaments past a famous act for research for an exact time keeper.
And offered a reward of 10,000 pounds for an instrument which could be accurate to 1
degree longitude on a voyage from England to the West Indies. They offered 15,000 pounds
for 2/3 of a degree and 20,000 pounds for half of a degree. In other words, the timepiece
had to be accurate to 1 minute a month.
In 1718, the Academy of Science in Paris with an issue from Count Mesely offered a reward
of 2,000 liras for the same timepiece.
In 1765, John Harrison (1693 - 1776) made the first marine chronometer and collected the
prize of 10,000 pounds for his marine clock which he had devoted more than 40 years of his
life. He then received later on 8750 pounds in 1773 for an improved marine clock
In 1747, Daniel
Bernouelli of Basle (1700-1782), a famous mathematician and professor of physics at Saint
Petersburg was awarded the French prize for his theoretical work on the subject.
In 1754, English Clock Maker Thomas Mudge (1715-1794) made marine chronometers with lever
escapements.In 1765, Pierre LeRoy (1717- 1785), French Clockmaker made marine chronometers
which made navigation far less hazardous and stimulated the economic and demographic
expansion of Europe.
In 1769, Ferdinand Berthoud (1725 - 1807), a Swiss Clock maker, made outstanding marine
chronometers.
In 1800, in France, only warships were supplied with marine chronometers and the first
known inventory made in 1832 lists a total of 143 marine chronometers for the French Navy.
John Arnold (1736 - 1799) started making marine chronometers for commercial use in
England.
Famous English Clock makers Josiah Emery (1725-1796) and Thomas Earnshaw (1749-1829), were
also commissioned to make marine chronometers for commercial use.
The annual competitions in accuracy first organized at the Observatory of Kew-Teddington,
the Frech Observatory of Besancon and by the Swiss Observations of Geneva (after 1873) and
Neufchatel (after 1875) contributed greatly to the advance of the marine chronometer.
After the middle of the century, high standards of precision were recorded.
Means variations in the
daily rate: .2-.3 seconds per day. Daily rate of Gain: + 1 to 2 seconds per day
Taking into account the other possible errors that could intervene in a determination of
longitude, it was now possible to find the position of a ship at sea within one or two
miles near the equator and less then a mile in temperate zones.
The Nineteenth Century
Also known as the Industrial Revolution was a social and technological phenomenon. It had no clear beginning or ending, some people see it as a spin off from the development of the stem power which is technology, others as a progression from an agricultural base to an industrial one, however as it is seen in human terms it represents one of the greatest upheavals mankind has ever experienced.
In the horological field in the beginning of the nineteenth century there was a nation wide demand for cheap timekeepers. The clockmaker however were quite content that were not engaged in the chronometer competition and were busy developing their extensive and highly lucrative export
In 1752 Pierre Caron from Beaumarchais made a watch for the Madame de Pompadour which was fitted into a finger ring. It measured nine millimeters in diameter. It consisted of a ring around the dial carrying a projecting hook, by drowning this hook with the nail two thirds around the dial the ring is rewound and goes for thirty hours.
There are sources that tell a story about Queen Elizabeth I who got a small round jewel-studded watch fastened to an armlet by one of her favorites, the Earl of Leicester, in 1571. It is said that the first person who actually wore a watch on the wrist was the eminent French mathematician and philosopher, Blaise Pascal (1623-1662). With a piece of string he had fastened his pocketwatch to his wrist.
In 1820 Thomas Perst invented the first watch to be enabled to be wound by the pendant knob without any detached key or winder. In 1793 Robert Lestie invented a curly form of keyless winding type known as the pump wind
In 1827 J. A. Berrollas patented the first barrel ratchet with click and spring, which keeps the maintaining power up.
In 1869 B. Hass invented a front cover winding in his hunter watch. The action of opening the cover wound the mainspring.
In 1838 Louis Audemars of Le Brassus invented the first watch that could be wound and set through the pendant.
In 1844 Adolph Nicole patented a form of winding watches through the handle with a knob.
America
America can not be said to have had a watch making industry until the year 1830. Most existing American watches were made after 1850. In 1800 Thomas Harland was in business in Norwich, Connecticut, were he was reported to be making 200 watches per annum. In 1820, Luther Goddarth increased the number to five hundred watches at Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, but these watches were not as interesting as their clocks of the 1800 period.
Long Case Clocks
In 1682 Abel Correy (1655-1711) emigrated with William Penn and settled in Philadelphia, starting making plain clocks with flat-topped hoods that were indistinguishable from the English predecessors. The curly horns of English provincial pattern appeared on the hood of American clocks throughout the second half of the 16th century. Free standing corner pillars on the hood were fashionable and an occasional panel on the door with a cockle (shell top known as the "Rhode Island Block Front" style.) In 1790 a different type of hood rarely found in England appeared. Simon and Aaron Willard of Massachusetts created hoods with a break-arch top and an outer edge decorated by a crest or band or irregular outline, colloquially known as "Whales-tails". Later this cresting became a little wider, and pierced, and thus produced a very decorative and tasteful effect. Long case clocks were either 30 hours or 8 days according to whether were made of wood or brass. In 1817 Ely Terry (1772-1852) introduced the finest shelf clock known as the "Pillar and Scroll" shelf clock.
America Shelf Clocks
In 1825 Chauncey Jerome, clockmaker from the firm of Terry, introduced the "Bronze and Looking-Glass Clock", but he did not have the ability of a salesman and his business failed catastrophically.
Shape Beautiful and Functional
In 1802 Simon Willard patented the Banjo clock and accounted to the most important contribution to American horology. The "Lyre" is simple a banjo were the trunk is shaped as a lyre. The "Girandole" is a banjo with circular base. After 1830 the design of American clocks deteriorated and became coarse as those of European countries.
Wall Clocks
The earliest American hanging wall clocks were hooded with 30 hour movements with weight and pendulum, known colloquially as WAG-ON-WALL. Wooden movements run for 30 hours and brass movements run for eight days.
Austria
In the 18th century most clocks cases followed the English style coupled with Austrian baroque ornamentation, in the South however began to develop the bulbous provincial French style, the dials however followed English styles. In 1780 a regulator clock began to become popular, the pendulum rod was either wood or Gridiron and was dead-beat escapement with pin wheel type. In 1740 a national style in brackets clocks begin to develop. They were of ebony with bold ormolu mounts and coarsely engrave. In 1780 a great variety of bracket clocks known as "stockuhr" or "stutzuhr" (meaning a short clock). Those clocks existed considerably in Austria. In 1800 came a further variety of styles, a miniature clock almost a toy called the "zappler" two and a half inches high had very fast movements and a tiny pendulum, the escapement was usually a rudimentary form of cylinder. Austrian watches are of high quality but display no markedly national characteristics.
England
By 1800 the principal
markets seem to have been the continent of Europe especially England were London mad
products had been subject of massive local forgery. In those days the exporting craftsman
went to enormous lengths to ascertain what it's customers required, a factor ignored by
many Brittish importers. It is often said that the English exported were only those that
were not good enough for the home market. Being realistic they adjusted the quality of t
such goods according to the price they could obtain and the variety demanded, actually the
best kind were exported. Looking first at the Far Eastern markets, the Chinese seem to
have had an insatiable appetite for clocks of the most elaborately decorated kind. But
using revolving jeweled spirals, glass water-simulating spouts and falls, rotating finials
and cupolas and the provision of music to accompany them. The case work also had to be
embellished in what, to the English tasted at that time, must have seemed a most vulgar
manner. Yet it is clear that the Chinese valued such devices wholly as sophisticated toys
of the time, not as timekeepers.
India was, of course, particularly susceptible to the
absorption of large quantities of English-made timekeepers as simply another manifestation
of its Empire status. The East India Company handled clocks and watches until it was
finally wound up just after the mid ninetenth century. Even though clock and watch making
in England was still a craft-based manufacture - as will be seen, it did not finally
abandon this method in favor of mass production until the twentieth century.
By the end of the eighteenth century English craftsmen
were supplying a large number of fine timepieces to the Near East, and particularly to
Turkey. It is not at all uncommon, therefore, to find good London-made clocks and watches
with dials inscribed with numerals in Turkish characters. Watches made for the Turkish
market left this country with at least three cases, instead of the customary pair, and
were often fitted with yet a fourth on arrival at their final destination. This
extraordinary protection may have been simply to exclude dust and dirt in a country where
such inconveniences were part of the way of life to a larger extent than in Europe. The
popularity of English clocks and watches stemmed from their reliability, which in turn
derived from the traditional English interest in performance rather than appearance.
Holland was one of the most thriving European markets,
timepieces intended for that country will always be found to have the arcaded minute band
which was so much favored there. The forgeries of English work, incidentally were almost
invariably very easy to detect. It never seemed to occur to those that produced them that
they might study what they were attempting to emulate in order at least to attempt a
facsimile. Miss-spelling of makers' names, styles wholly out of keeping with English
practice and forged hallmarks on cases.
Switzerland-Enameled Watches
During the last half of
the 18 the Swiss caulons enjoyed considerate economic prosperity, Geneva won it's
international reputation as the place for luxury watches and enamel decorations. The great
masters of the Geneva school of painting on enamel built their careers in the European
courts and often returned to Geneva empowered by their intense professional lives and
passed their skills to art's and who had stayed at home. The Geneva artisans knew how to
please the various tastes of their wide range of clients, they invented decorative
solutions to each one of them, they are so call Chinese, watches, Turkish, etc.
In the history of watch making, Geneva was a veritable
school for geniuses, the creators co-coordinated their production established models and
allocated constructions to various workshops this may they set up exemplary assembly lines
Geneva was at first the center of watch-making in Switzerland but the industry spread to other cantons, some of which rivaled the supremacy of Geneva.. Switzerland has mostly concentrated on the manufacture of watches as opposed to clocks
French
French craftsman designer, whom many consider to have been the greatest genius in this field ever to have lived. Abraham-Louis Breguet was born at Neufchatel in Switzerland in 1747 and died in 1823, and during his working life produced some of the most elegant, as well as the most superbly designed and constructed, timepieces the world has ever known. He made a substantial contribution, by way of original invention, to the progress of accurate time measurement, but more particularly, perhaps, he seemed to have at his disposal a never-ending supply of creative designs for his work.
German
The Germans, especially the Black Forest cottage industry, and eventually the Swiss. While the Black Forest product - of rudimentary construction, with wood used for as many components as possible in place of the much more expensive brass - also rapidly gained acceptance. The most popular version of this last type, known as the postman's alarm, had a mainly wooden movement behind a circular painted dial, which was encircled by a hinged and polished hardwood bezel holding the protective convex glass. Centrally positioned on this dial was a small alarm dial, and the whole mechanism was weight-driven, elementary and trouble-free. Other versions of the Black Forest clocks included the ubiquitous cuckoo clock, often - incorrectly - attributed to the Swiss.
The Black Forest were clocks that were made by peasants from the German black forest in the middle of the seventeenth century who turned to clock making. The earliest type of the mid seventeenth century had a foliot balance, going train and one hand. All the parts were wooden except the verge, metal pins served for teeth in the escape wheel, and the weight was stone. In 1730 came the addition of the strike mechanism, the pendulum and finally the cuckoo. The first cuckoo had a bird and a trap-door very much like those still made. The bird call is produced by two small organ pipes, tuned a minor third apart and miniature bellows. The first clocks had wooden dials painted in watercolors and a single wooden hand. Variants were introduced during the 19th century but the popular "chalet" style did not appear until 1850.
Collecting
Collecting watches can be dangerous. It can become an addiction, and you need more and more... But seriously, collecting watches can be fun and it does not require lots of money to get started. If you go to a flea market and buy any old watch for a couple of bucks, this could be the start of a beautiful friendship. If you are able to open the case or better yet, let a watchmaker open it for you, you will see a small miracle. It is like an living organism with a heart that beats like ours and where wheels spin around each other and work together to form a machine that enables us to keep time. And when you can see the beauty of the tiny machined parts, the wheels set in ruby and gold and the craftsmanship that created it all, you are likely to become a collector yourself. First of all be aware of what you are buying.