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George Daniels - The appeal of mechanical watches (70/85)

1,625 views · Published 12 July 2017 · 1:19 · Indexed 22 October 2026

Channel: Web of Stories - Life Stories of Remarkable People · 2017 · Science & Technology

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English watch-maker George Daniels (1926-2011) was most famous for creating the co-axial escarpment and could make a complete watch by hand.  In his lifetime, he received many awards, including the rarely-given Gold Medal of the Clockmakers' Company of London. [Listener: Roger Smith; date recorded: 2003]

TRANSCRIPT: Why do people like mechanical watches? Well I suppose it is that even though their watch is not specially handmade for them, it contains all the same components in principle to a really complex handmade collector's piece and purchasers of these modern easily available watches see them quite simply as wristwatch examples of the very things that the collector is looking for. They love to see a case full of gear wheels and a balance oscillating and many, many watches now have crystal backs so that the works can be seen. People like to see the works going round and... well all that's good for the mechanical watch industry, which itself is a far better base for expansion of the watch industry in the present financial climate where more and more people can afford more expensive watches. And you can only put the price up on a quartz watch when you can make a mechanical watch more expensive by adding various devices to it and so forth.

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