Beginning of Time, the Birth of Watches

Thousands of years ago, approximately 2000BC the Ancient Egyptians used to divide the day into two twelve hour periods and used a device that was called an obelisk to track the sun. The obelisk was a tall four walled structure that had a triangle or pyramid shaped top and the Egyptians used it to track the movements of the sun and in effect to gauge time. In this era they were also the first to develop water clocks to begin to start measuring time. Other primitive methods of keeping time were hour glasses, candle clock and also a time stick.

Original time keeping was kept by shadow, this was not accurate and relied on good weather to be effective, next escapement mechanism was used, then engineers developed water clocks that were slightly different as they were driven by weights and gears. The next development came in Europe in the sixteenth century when verge escapement mechanisms were used, then quickly followed by the spring powered clock, pocket watch and then the pendulum clock in around the eighteenth century. The final breakthrough was quite recently in the twentieth century with the technology of quartz oscillators which is by far the most efficient and well used method of time keeping on the planet today. Nearly all modern clocks and wrist watches operate using the quartz oscillator technology as it is the most accurate and universally accepted method.

Throughout time, since the birth of time keeping and the need for watches, there have been watch repairs experts. Even many thousands of years ago, when there was a blockage with the sand in an hour glass or an issue with the gears of a water clock, there were skilled professional watch repairs services that would have fixed the device. As the years have passed and the technology has gotten smaller and more complex, watch repairs has become an integral part of the watch industry. Watches are precious, sentimental and expensive items and people do not want to replace them when they stop or break, so the market of watch repairs has been around since the birth of time keeping and its aim has been to keep the devices of the era in working order.

As we enter the digital age time keeping is beginning to be kept more and more up to date via mobile phones and global positioning system (GPS). Watches are constantly evolving from the simple contraptions they once were to the technological marvels they are. Watches will continue to develop in technology, and as they do watch repairs will continue to develop hand in hand with them.

In any event time keeping was started with shadows, moved on to sand, water, mechanics, springs, quartz oscillators and now it appears to be satellites. As the years pass by, people must ask themselves how time will be kept in one hundred years or even a thousand years.

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