So You Want A Standard for Comparison
Part 3 of 3

by Watchking

It can never be the same as it was in the American watch business from the 1890s to the 1930s. All costs of production including labor were low. All production was centralized. With no real competitors to fear there could be hundreds of designers and craftsmen involved in any project and the factories were medium sized cities where every worker lived, breathed and discussed watchmaking for 18 hours a day. No wonder so many great products were developed. As well, there were culling and Quality Control procedures that involved making thousands of every part from which tested systems were made of matched units to tolerances only being equaled by the most expensive watches made today. 

Statistically the watches made then had to be more internally synergistic and thus better. You might have to open a few hundred run-of-the mill American pocket watches before you chance upon one of the jewels but when you do you will realize why this period of greatness is past. When you do find that superb gem, whether it costs you $50, or even $350 you will have a watch that will make you wonder about the genius of other eras. Incidentally, a Howard/Keystone #11, Railroad chronometer recently sold at auction for $350. Whether you shop long and hard for a marine detente chronometer or a Breguet at the high end, these watches are "standards" which can make most good watches pale by comparison today.

Breguet and the great American houses made watches that were designed to last a MILLENIUM if properly maintained. This astounding goal is not even a consideration in the mind of today's designers. The Breguets were all made in limited quantities so it was reasonable to assume that a family would pass a watch along from generation to generation. The first great American watches from Howard were also made in small numbers, considering the size of the market. This was the reason why watches were made to last a thousand years.

As the American companies got better at making these works of art they began competing to make them better AND better-priced. Within 20 years of the end of the Civil war they became like the house of Picasso turning out hundreds and then eventually thousands of masterworks. Some of these will make your jaw drop. The glen plaid engraving on the plates of many South Bend watches is so ornate that it is rarely matched even today. 

There are watches that are gorgeously finished that have had their timing sheets preserved and which show less than 1 second variation per month compared to the specs they were meeting one hundred years ago, in every position, at every temperature and even while swinging to test for isochronism. It's too bad that all the watchmakers who made these gems and the watch "cities" where they were built are gone today. 

Get one of these "standards" and preserve some of history's finest timepieces. It will always be an inspiration to you that such greatness can be produced in less than ideal circumstances. It will also help you to have high standards when you are buying the watches you wear every day.