A tale of wristwatches

Ask Smithsonian curator Carlene Stephens to describe how keeping time has changed and this globe-trotting clock researcher tells the tale of wristwatches.

"Few people realize it," she says, "but the development of the modern wristwatch is actually one of the most fascinating stories in the history of science and technology.

"I've just spent several months traveling around the world, talking to the inventors of the electronic watch, which came on the scene only about 30 years ago.

"If you know anything about watches, you probably know that they've had a 'guts change' during the past few decades. And my Smithsonian colleague and I, Maggie [Margaret] Dennis, AS '98M, have been on the road, ferreting out many of the people who engineered that change.

"Our goal has been to document the shift from mechanical to electronic. Why? Because we think it's hugely important, in terms of how the world deals with time," she says.

How popular
are today's
battery-powered and quartz-driven wristwatches?

According to Stephens, whose exhibition "On Time" was unveiled at the National Museum
of American History in November the old-fashioned, wind-up watch
is nearly extinct in 1999. These days, she points out, only 13 percent of the wristwatches being worn around the globe are still powered by mechanical springs and balance-wheel assemblies.

"The evolution of the ordinary wristwatch is a good example of the kinds of stories we love to tell at the Smithsonian," says Stephens. "It's a story about culture, about changing values and attitudes. You can learn a great deal about a society if you study the objects it produces."