A Very American Story (History Of The Waltham Watch Company)

The history of the Waltham Watch Company isn’t as well known as it should be. It invented the American Watchmaking System, which was pioneered by Aaron Dennison. He’s the American behind the system of interchangeable parts and mass produced watch movements. He also started the company that would become Waltham – a prolific American watchmaker that unfortunately ceased to exist after 1957. In this post, I’d like to dive deeper into Waltham’s history, including its post-American days (and all the way up until today).

History Of The American Waltham Watch Company – The Beginning

It can be said that the Waltham Watch Company descended directly from Aaron Lufkin Dennison. He technically started his first company in 1850 using interchangeable parts. The name “American Waltham Watch Company” was chosen in 1885. This was after a series of name changes (and a relocation from Boston to Waltham, Massachusetts).

By the 1890s, Waltham was producing the most precise watches in the world. They were also affordable and so precise that every railroad in the US used them to time trains, according to Amy Green, PhD (and resident historian for the Charles River Museum of Industry and Innovation).

Waltham was apparently so successful at producing a precise and accessible product at an efficient scale that it led to “Swiss fakes”. These were cheaper Swiss watches that were intended to look like (and be mistaken as) Waltham watches. Essentially they were replica watches that looked similar to a genuine Waltham, but often didn’t perform like one.

The below pocket watch dates to roughly 1904, so it was produced during the American Waltham Watch Company days. It was a gift from my wife, and also my gateway into pocket watches.

The “double sunk” dial is enamel and still in good shape. The hands are thermally blued, so they appear black most of the time, but shift to a brilliant blue when the hands catch the light at the right angle.

The movement is also interesting, with some nice damaskeening done for decorative purposes. I think it looks great, and it’s something different than the Geneva stripes and perlage found on highly-decorated modern Swiss movements.

The Waltham Watch Company, And Its Slow Decline…

The company again changed its name, this time to Waltham Watch Co. in 1907. It kept going strong all the way until the 1940s. When World War 2 hit, Waltham dedicated its entire focus on the war effort, which also meant it didn’t sell any watches to civilians.

It wasn’t just Waltham that focused solely on the military, either. During World War 2, the entire powerhouse US watchmaking industry focused all of its efforts on wartime production. This left a major gap in supply during the war, and placed American watchmakers at a disadvantage.

Swiss watchmakers could still produce watches for civilians, and Swiss imports accounted for just over 60% of the US watch market by 1941 as a result. This market share was “sticky” for the Swiss, and the US watchmaking industry was a shell of its former self by the 1950s.

Waltham was officially defunct as an American company in 1957, but it had also set up a Swiss subsidiary in 1954: Waltham International SA. It retained the rights to the Waltham name outside of North America, continuing to produce mechanical wrist watches and pocket watches under the “Waltham” brand.

Post-1957 Waltham Watch Company

The company would go on to open an office in New York, importing Swiss watch movements and cases. Due to restrictions placed on the company by its creditors, however, it couldn’t actually sell any watches. It found a work-around by selling the watches through an independent company, the Hallmark Watch Company.

Waltham would later merge with the Hallmark Watch Company in 1959. This allowed the combined company to access replacement parts and service Waltham watches that had been produced previously.

In the 1960s, the company was forced by the FTC to change its advertising and branding. The FTC wanted to make it clear to consumers that it wasn’t related to the original Waltham Watch Company, and that its products were not in fact made in America. It was then taken over by a consortium of brands, which included Invicta.

Then, in the 1970s, “new” Waltham merged into a federation with other Swiss manufacturers, The Société des Garde-Temps SA (SGT).

My father in-law’s gold Waltham dates to this era, and was the primary inspiration for this post. He purchased the watch in 1975 on Market Street in San Francisco, and it was his first “good watch” that he purchased for himself.

The dial is still in great shape (besides some scratches on the crystal), and after a couple turns of the crown, it still runs – although it definitely needs a service.

A nicely framed date window fits in with the applied indices and Arabic numerals, keeping the overall symmetry of the dial intact. The domed gold dial compliments the gold-filled case.

“Incabloc 17” is also proudly displayed on the dial, so there’s a good shock protection system in place, although I’m not quite sure what kind of movement powers the watch (other than it contains 17 jewels and it’s Swiss).

Waltham today

SGT would later fall victim to the Quartz Crisis, shutting its doors in 1981. The rights to the individual brands were sold off individually, and what happened to Waltham from there is a little murky.

I’m not sure who owns the Waltham name at this point, but I do know it’s still being used. As I was searching for something at my local CVS, a display case with “Waltham” watches caught my eye. These say Waltham on the dial, but have Japanese quartz movements and appear to be produced by Accutime Watch Corp (according to the caseback).

I saw the watch and figured “why not?”. It’s now my son’s first field watch. Unlike some of my entry-level Seikos (and even my Speedmaster), it also “hacks” – so I can set the precise time when I pull the crown out and the seconds hand stops. Not bad for ten bucks, I’d say.

A History of Waltham: Told Through Watches

Now that my American Waltham pocket watch and my father-in-law’s 1970’s Waltham wristwatch are joined by my son’s quartz Waltham field watch, we have a collected history of the brand.

The transitioning is also interesting: an American movement in the pocket watch, a Swiss movement in the 1970s wristwatch, and a Japanese quartz movement in the modern watch. It’s a visual depiction of the brand name’s evolution through almost two centuries.

I think it’s cool to see a group shot of all these watches together, even if the original company technically went out of business in 1957. It’s a little crazy to think about, considering Aaron Lufkin Dennison’s first company first started all the way back in 1850.

The American Watchmaking System would later be exported to Switzerland through an American, Florentine Ariosto Jones, who founded International Watch Company (or IWC) in 1868. Another “fun fact”: Ford sedans had Waltham speedometers in 1937, making the Waltham speedometer the only one in a Ford to ever display the name of its manufacturer.

Waltham’s Legacy

In a day-and-age when brands are very good about making their history known (and keeping their accomplishments alive through clever marketing campaigns and good storytelling), I think brands such as Waltham unfairly get left off the list of great watchmakers.

As a fan of basketball, I look at it like this. Everyone considers Michael Jordan the greatest (or maybe Kobe or LeBron, but I won’t get into that argument here). But what about Wilt Chamberlain? In Wilt’s days, there weren’t any signature Nike sneakers or celebrity athletes, but he was arguably the most dominant player to ever pick up a basketball. He even scored 100 points in one game. That game wasn’t televised. If it was, maybe Wilt’s name would surface more often in the conversation for greatest of all time.

Waltham doesn’t have a “Moonwatch” and it wasn’t part of the “Dirty Dozen“. It wasn’t even really around as an American company after 1957 – so it was gone before the more modern age of marketing and storytelling. I think that’s part of the reason it’s relatively unknown amongst non-watch collectors.

It’s a shame, because in a lot of ways, Waltham was one of the foundational watchmakers. It pioneered the entire system of interchangeable parts, which would later be adopted by the vast majority of the industry – in Switzerland and everywhere else.

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