January 3rd is a special day in time because it marks a huge leap in the telling of time. It was on this day 65 years ago that the Hamilton Watch Company introduced the electric watch.
Prior to this, watches were either hand-wound or used kinetic energy from wrist movement to function.
The Hamilton Electric watch marked the first step toward the modern battery powered quartz revolution. The Hamilton Watch Company began developing the time-piece in 1946 and took 11 years to reach the production stage.
The ‘Hamilton electric 500’, as it was known, was touted as the ‘watch of the future’ and was a hit with many including celebrities like Elvis Presley who sported it in movies such as ‘Blue Hawaii’.
One of the iconic watches of the time was the ‘Ventura’, which was designed by Richard Arbib. The watch had an ultra-modern design with non-traditional, asymmetrical styling. It had a pioneering triangular design that broke conventions of the day. This watch subsequently became known as the ‘Elvis watch’.
Though the resulting timepiece was a never-before innovation, it suffered from many fundamental glitches. Even though collaboration with Japanese watch-making firm Ricoh was lined up, Hamilton was unable to compete with Japanese watchmaker Seiko, which introduced the first quartz wrist watch in 1969.
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