Does anyone have an old railroad watch? I have my fathers; an Elgin. I remember him having to take it in to a "certified" watchmaker periodically to get its accuracy checked. It was running in 1939 when he retired from the railroad but it doesn't run now. Watchmaker said it would have to be disassembled so the dried oil could be cleaned out of the jewel bearings and that it would then be good as new. He wanted a big price to do it, so I declined. Watchmaker said such watchs were common and not worth a great deal as antiques. The case was gold plated and the movement was 21 jewel IIRC. Gerry --------------------------------------------- ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gary Hurst" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> you have heard the expression "on the ball?" webb c ball had a jewelery > shop on cleveland where the time was wired in from the US Naval > Observatory > and displayed in the window. webb ball and those who came by his shop in > cleveland really were among the few in that age who could answer the > question of whether anybody knows what time it is. > > webb really liked precision timekeepers. he'd buy very good movements > from > very solid makers and "hot rod" them in the shop. you could go into > ball's > shop and buy one of hte most accurate watches on the earth at the end of > the > 19th century. and then ball and his crew could keep it running like that > for you indefinitely. > > ball's watches really, really good and priced accordingly. the average > man > in the street had neither the means to afford such a timepiece nor the > need > for one, as he could live happily with a 15 second a day watch and didn't > need one that was tuned to 15 seconds a season. so what was ball to do? > > he went out telling eveyrone the story of how there was this terrible > train > crash caused by imprecise timekeeping and how a ball watch maintained at > the > ball shop was the way to solve this so it would never happen again. as it > says in wikipedia: > > In 1891 there was a collision between Lake Shore and Michigan Southern > Railways at Kipton, Ohio <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kipton%2C_Ohio> > which > occurred because an engineer <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineer>'s > watch > had stopped. The railroad officials commissioned Webb C. Ball as their > Chief > Time Inspector, in order to establish precision standards and a reliable > timepiece inspection system for Railroad > chronometers<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railroad_chronometers> > . > He established strict guidelines for the manufacturing of sturdy, reliable > precision timepieces, including resistance to magnetism, reliability of > time > keeping in 5 positions, > isochronism<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Isochronism&action=edit>, > power reserve <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_reserve> and dial > arrangement, accompanied with record keeping of the reliability of the > watch > on each regular inspection > > the legendary railroad watch is established and the ball watch is king of > them all. only thing is, though, there never was such a crash. _______________________________________ http://www.okiebenz.com For new parts see official list sponsor: http://www.buymbparts.com/ For used parts email [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
