Instruments · Timer
Stopwatch / timer by Horstmann Gear Co. Ltd. (maker), England, 1940-1974
- Maker / attribution
- Horstmann Gear Co. Ltd. (maker) (maker)
- Date
- 1940-1974
- Historical period
- Modern Mechanical Horology (1945 – 1969)
- Country of origin
- England
- Place
- Bath, Bath and North East Somerset, England, United Kingdom, Bath
- Object type
- Timer
- Dimensions
- overall: 70 mm x 72 mm
- Holding institution
- Science Museum Group, London
- Accession / object no.
- 1995-56
- Credit line
- Horstmann Gear Group Ltd.
- Catalogue title (original)
- Synchronous motor driven timer of a type used for controlling street lighting
Record summary
Held and catalogued by Science Museum Group, London (object number 1995-56), this is a timer by Horstmann Gear Co. Ltd. (maker), made in Bath, Bath and North East Somerset, England, United Kingdom, Bath, dated 1940-1974. The Atlas places it in the Modern Mechanical Horology period (1945 – 1969) of its Instruments collection. Recorded dimensions: overall: 70 mm x 72 mm. The record is illustrated with 1 photograph.
Assembled from the source record's structured fields. Dates and attributions are given as the source states them; where a field is missing the Atlas leaves it blank rather than estimating.
Catalogue description
The source record does not include a narrative description. The structured fields above are reproduced from it.
Historical context
Modern Mechanical Horology (1945 – 1969)
Tool watches for divers, pilots and astronauts; electric watches anticipate the electronic age.
Electronic instruments, quartz frequency standards and the first atomic clocks transformed precision timing in laboratories and broadcasting.
Read the period in the timelineMore instruments from this periodEarlier: Golden Age of Mechanical Watchmaking
Atlas type guide
Timers, stopwatches, chronoscopes and time recorders
Instruments for measuring short intervals or recording when something happened form a large and practical branch of horology. Sports stopwatches and split-seconds timers, laboratory chronoscopes (such as Hipp's, which measured thousandths of a second for psychology and ballistics experiments), metronomes for music, watchmen's clocks that recorded patrol rounds, and the time recorders that clocked factory workers in and out all derive from clock and watch technology.
These objects matter historically because they show timekeeping leaving the observatory and the drawing room and entering industry, science and sport. Many were mass-produced, and their dials, scales and patents chart the rise of electrification and industrial management.
What to look for
- Scales graduated in fifths, tenths or hundredths of a second, or decimal minutes for industrial use.
- Start, stop and reset push-pieces; a second hand that can be stopped independently (split seconds).
- Recording devices: paper discs or tapes, printing mechanisms, keys or punches.
- Patent numbers and dates on the dial or case, which give a terminus post quem.
Dating clues
- Hipp chronoscopes were made from the 1840s into the twentieth century.
- Employee time recorders spread from the 1890s (Bundy, IBM, International Time Recording Co.).
- Quartz and electronic timers replaced mechanical stopwatches in sport from the 1970s.
General guidance written by the Atlas editors about this kind of object. It is not a statement about this particular piece; for that, rely on the source record above and on physical examination.
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