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  1. Fritz genuflects before the mighty quartzophobe Sep 6, 2014

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    Digging through my file of watch pictures lifted off the internet I found these and want to share them.

    We all love Swiss watches, particularly Omega, but, for those who never knew it or perhaps have forgotten, I'd like to remind all that America once was the leader in mass produced quality jeweled watches while the Swiss raced to catch up. Waltham was the first big factory to truly mass produce high quality watches, Elgin made 55,000,000 of them in their time, the American railway watch stands second to nothing else for tough accurate timekeeping over long periods of rough use and Hamiltons 922, 992B and 950B movements are among the best ever made.

    How about a Waltham with agate plates, known as the stone movement, it gives a whole new twist to "quartz" watch....

    Rare as hell when new and far to delicate to survive regular use, its got to stand alone as a real work of art.

    And yes, they made more than one.....

    stonemountain.jpg


    kinda looks like the wheels are floating in space huh!

    WalthamStone02.jpg

    By the way, the first really successful Swiss watch to be mass produced in the American style?

    Accurate, tough and with truly interchangeable parts?

    Brandt's caliber 19.... which he called the Omega.
     
  2. mondodec Editor Constellation Collectors Blog Sep 6, 2014

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    You're absolutely right, it was in the 1890s that Brandt introduced the double assembly line to Switzerland and part of the innovation was interchangeable parts between members of a calibre family. Happens to this day at Omega.

    Sad that the US quality watch manufacturing industry has declined to almost nothing.
     
  3. ulackfocus Sep 6, 2014

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    Excellent post. :thumbsup: People forget that the Swiss didn't catch up and surpass American watchmaking quality until the US went into full war mode in the early 1940's.
     
  4. MMMD unaffiliated curmudgeonly absurdist & polyologist Sep 6, 2014

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  5. Fritz genuflects before the mighty quartzophobe Sep 6, 2014

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    The American watch industry was already in terminal decline by 1900, Waltham was on the rocks before being saved by WW1 and then faded until WW2 kept them alive for a few more years (1950ish) Elgin faded out quickly after the war as well. (55) Only Hamilton really kept up a successful business after the war until they stopped making watches in America (in the late 60s I think) You only have to look at a 1940 Waltham Vanguard to see how bad it was, all the extra beauty was gone, it really was a nasty looking movement at the end. The cutting of tarrifs on Swiss watches really hurt the Americans, who hadn't kept their equipment and designs up to compete with...... lets face it..... the likes of Omega's 30mm.

    I hope Shinola, who are bringing Swiss quartz movements in now, can get going well enough to make an affordable American watch. I love my Omegas but it would be nice to buy something made closer to home.
     
  6. gatorcpa ΩF InvestiGator Staff Member Sep 6, 2014

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    WWII caused the US companies to be (more-or-less) nationalized and required them to use 20 to 30 year old designs for military production, because that's what they wanted. Quick, cheap and easy to service. After WWII, it wasn't so easy to switch back to a consumer driven marketplace after four years of bending over backwards to please the generals.

    I was with you up to the comment on the Omega 30mm movement. Some of the later Hamilton movements, particularly the Grade 770, were equal in quality any of the Swiss movements at the time. American made Elgins were competitive in quality, if not price.

    The issue was more that the Swiss were able to hire watchmakers in Europe for a lot less than Americans were making in the inflationary period just after the war. This brought their unit cost down tremendously. Decent quality Swiss movements could be had in the late 1940's for only a few dollars, where a mid-grade American movement had to cost $10-$20 to produce. That's why the American companies started buying them as fast as they could starting in 1946.

    Soon thereafter, US watch companies being investing in Switzerland and vice-versa. Then it got real interesting when the same US companies that had lobbied for protectionist tariffs in the 1920's and 1930's began opposing the same tariffs in the 1950's.

    Hope this helps,
    gatorcpa
     
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  7. bill5959 Sep 7, 2014

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    my wife's relatives lived near Elgin IL and a few worked there. The factories were huge and the economics of watches made those towns, no different than Motown but on a smaller scale. It was amazing to hear the stories. The economists call what followed disruptive technologies, but it's far more complicated. I grew up on Elgin and Hamiltom. Still a Hamilton pocket watch In my family.
     
  8. Fritz genuflects before the mighty quartzophobe Sep 7, 2014

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    wearing my '08 Hamilton 992 today.... lovely accurate watch!