Watch, Waterbury, Series J
date: label: date made
content: ca 1890
name: label: maker
content: Waterbury Watch Co.
notes: label: Description
content: Dating from between 1891 and 1898, this watch represents a new design that its manufacturer, the Waterbury Watch Company, hoped would overcome difficulties with an earlier product, the Long Wind.
label: Description
content: In 1880 the Waterbury Watch Co., then a new corporation founded by Connecticut brass manufacturers Benedict and Burnham, sold the Long Wind for $3.50. This was in sharp contrast to the cheapest American-made watches at that time, which sold, cased, for between $8 and $20. At first the company had great success, but interest waned after middlemen devised a scheme to give away the Long Wind with the purchase of a suit of clothes. The firm then tried to revive falling sales with more conventional and costly watch designs like this watch, a lively advertising campaign and, in 1898, a new corporate name--the New England Watch Company. The pioneering enterprise ultimately failed in 1912, but other firms would take up the manufacture of cheap reliable timepieces that came to be known as “dollar” watches.
label: Description
content: Details:
label: Description
content: Movement: spring-driven, duplex escapement, regulator with indicator between plates, back plate marked: “TRADEMARK/The Waterbury Watch Co./WATERBURY/CONN. U.S.A./Patented Series J; between plates marked: “Duplex/Patents” and numerous patent dates.
label: Description
content: Dial: white enamel, blued steel hands with second hand missing, sunk seconds at 6; marked: “WATERBURY/logo with initials for WWC
label: Description
content: Case: open face, nickel-plated, back snaps on
label: Description
content: References:
label: Description
content: Watch,” <i>Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology</i>, United States National Museum Bulletin 218 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1959).
label: Description
content: Harry Chase Brearley, <i>Time Telling Through the Ages</i> (New York: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1919).
label: Description
content: William J. Pape, <i>History of Waterbury and the Naugatuck Valley, Connecticut</i> (Chicago, New York: S. J. Clarke Publishing, 1918).
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Mechanisms
label: See more items in
content: Measuring & Mapping
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Dr. Thomas Featherstonhaugh
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: ME.259072
label: catalog number
content: 259072
label: accession number
content: 51251
objectType: label: Object Name
content: watch
label: Other Terms
content: watch; Mechanical, Spring-Driven; Pocket Watch
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: metal (watch case material)
label: Physical Description
content: brass (watch movement material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 3 in x 2 in x 5/8 in; 7.62 cm x 5.08 cm x 1.5875 cm