Hamilton, An American Original
Founded in 1892, Hamilton began its dedication to care and quality by taking nearly two years to produce its first watch. It was a hit.
By 1908, Hamilton was the major supplier to those needing accurate time display - the railroads. Their pocket watch became the standard for great styling and perfect reliability by which all others were judged.
Not long after, they introduced pendant (and later wrist) watches for women.
Not satisfied to restrict their wristwatches to the fairer sex, they designed a case and strap to appeal to men. Many who once said they would rather wear a dress than a ‘wristlet’ as they were then known, became converts.
The 1920s and 1930s saw the introduction of models that remain popular to this day. The Art Deco designs incorporated in Hamilton’s watches during the period are often said to be the pinnacle of the horologer’s craft.
One such model, the 1928 Yankee (named after the world champion Yankee baseball team), continues to be popular today. Both vintage models and contemporary designs are hot items among those who love watches.
Always a major supplier of reliable wristwatches to the military, the company moved beyond the popular utilitarian objects of WWI with their Khaki in WWII.
This simple, sturdy design stormed the beaches and trudged through the brush as reliably as those who wore them.
But Hamilton was never one to rest on its laurels. In the 1950s it developed a series of stylish timepieces that remain popular to this day.
The zenith of that development, by many accounts, is the famed Hamilton Ventura introduced in 1957. The world’s first electric watch, its triangular exterior matched the innovativeness of its components.
Anyone fortunate enough to own a 1957 chronometer, whether original or new (the design continues to be produced today), is the possessor of one of the finest personal timepieces in the world.
But the Tonneau, the Khaki Aviator, the Ventura, nor any other Hamilton represented the end of their advances.
In 1972 the company introduced the world’s first digital watch - the Pulsar. Completely simple in appearance, the watch contained the enormous complexity of an integrated circuit within the space of a wristwatch case.
The Pulsar displayed the time by a series of LEDs (those now-familiar small red dots or lines), controlled by a quartz oscillator. A simple push of the button showed the current time, with another ticking off the seconds. Early designs consumed too much power to continuously show the time.
The Pulsar-type display continues to be enormously popular, long ago replaced by LCDs, which consume less power. The originals, too, are still a favorite among collectors fetching many times the original price.
In the more than 30 years since, Hamilton has continued to innovate in precision, reliability and style. There’s no other watch like a Hamilton. Each is an American original.