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Ball Watch Co. |
The pocket watch and ensuing wristwatch industry that sprang up in America had a lot to do with the increasing popularity of trains and their need for precise timing. If an engineer's watch was off, people's lives could be in great danger. A need for great precision was recognized, and all of America's eastern railroad companies agreed upon a uniform time, including dividing the country into time zones, long before this was officially recognized or introduced by the government.
By 1893, many companies had adopted the General Railroad Timepiece Standards. Although they changed from year to year, the Standards included many characteristics of a high-quality Swiss watch: regulated in at least five positions, precision to within 30 seconds' rate gain or loss in a week, Breguet balance spring, and so on. And an American pocket watch industry emerged that was able to meet these qualifications.
One of the chief players in developing these standards, and thus the industry, was
Webster Clay Ball, or Webb C. Ball as he preferred to be known. Born in Fredericktown, Ohio, in 1847, Ball grew up on a farm. As a young man, he cast about for a new career and became an apprentice to watchmaker George Lewin, the town's jeweler. From there he moved on to a sales position for John Dueber, a manufacturer of watch cases. After purchasing an interest in the firm of Whitcomb and Metten in 1879, he was quick to buyout Metten, then
founding the Whitcomb and Ball Jewelry Store with his new partner. Later the same year, he bought out Whitcomb and established the Webb C. Ball Company in Clevelend, Ohio. The enterprising Ball was the first jeweler to use the time signals of the Naval Observatory in Washington after Standard Time was adopted in 1883, thus bringing precise time to Cleveland. Legend has it that he also imported the first chronometer to Ohio, which he put on display in his window.
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On July 19,1891, Ball was appointed chief inspector for The Lake Shore Lines. He invented a watch inspection system and a set of guidelines for timepieces that most American manufacturers set out to meet. Ball ended up being in charge of governing the precision of at least 175,000 miles of railroad, and he also extended his system into Mexico and Canada. His inspection system was set up to keep
records of a watch's performance using standard forms and uniform regulations, carefully supervising railroad time service with the aid of competent watchmakers. His system called for four standard watches to be present on every train, regardless of whether it was the passenger or freight variety. These timepieces were in the possession of the conductor, engineer, fireman, and rear brakeman. The watches were tested every two weeks and compared to standard Washington time. A variation of more than thirty seconds caused a watch to be sent in and repaired or regulated where necessary.
The Ball Watch Company has recently been resuscitated by a Far Eastern firm very interested in both the historical aspects of the traditional American railroad watch and the precision that high-quality Swiss timing and movements allow. With innovations such as the self-powered
micro gas lights providing long-life luminosity used on some of the dials in the Engineer collection as well as an incredibly attractive, 100 percent Swiss-made palette of timepieces of enviable size for a new company, Ball Watch Company is certainly soon to go whistling down the tracks. And with prices ranging from about $650 for a classic rail-styled day-date timepiece on a calf-skin strap to $1,250 for a limitededition certified chronometer, this is one new collection that is certainly worth going aboard
to see.
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BALL WATCH COMPANY
276 Narragansett Ave.
Lawrence, NY 11559
Tel: 5163712827
www.ballwatch.com
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