American horology

Connecticut clocks

Eli Terry's production of wooden-movement shelf clocks from the early 19th century, and the later brass movements of Seth Thomas, Ansonia and others, made the clock an affordable household object. Production in the hundreds of thousands per year was common by mid-century.

The American system of watchmaking

From 1850 Aaron Dennison and Edward Howard set out to make watches by machine with interchangeable parts. Their venture became the American Waltham Watch Company; Elgin (1864), Hamilton (1892) and many others followed. Machinery shown at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition of 1876 impressed the Swiss industry.

Railroad time

Standard time zones were adopted by the railroads in 1883. After a fatal collision in Ohio in 1891, Webb C. Ball developed watch standards for railroad service, and 'railroad grade' watches became a byword for reliability.

Electric and electronic firsts

The quartz clock was invented at Bell Laboratories (1927); the US National Bureau of Standards built an early atomic clock (1949). Hamilton's Electric 500 (1957), Bulova's Accutron (1960) and the Pulsar LED watch (1970–72) were American firsts.

Timeline

1. 1816Eli Terry patents his mass-produced pillar-and-scroll shelf clock — Eli Terry
2. 1850Aaron Dennison and Edward Howard begin factory watch production near Boston — American Waltham Watch Company
3. 1876Waltham's machinery shown at the Philadelphia Centennial alarms the Swiss industry — American Waltham Watch Company
4. 1883Railways in the United States and Canada adopt standard time zones
5. 1891Webb C. Ball's railroad watch standards follow a fatal train collision in Ohio — Hamilton Watch Company
6. 1896Ingersoll's 'Yankee' dollar watch brings watches to mass markets — Ingersoll
7. 1927Warren Marrison and J. W. Horton build the first quartz clock at Bell Laboratories — Quartz crystal oscillator
8. 1949The US National Bureau of Standards demonstrates an ammonia atomic clock — Caesium atomic standard
9. 1957Hamilton Electric 500, the first battery-powered wristwatch — Hamilton Watch Company
10. 1960Bulova Accutron, the tuning-fork watch — Tuning-fork oscillator
11. 1965NASA qualifies the Omega Speedmaster — Omega Speedmaster Professional
12. 1970–1972Hamilton Pulsar LED digital watch shown (1970) and sold (1972) — Hamilton Watch Company
13. 2015Apple Watch launched; smartwatches become a mass category