The Bite Magazine - Autumn/Winter 2023 - Issue 34

bitewatches A s America entered its golden age of industry and progress in 1875, a Bohemian immigrant from the Czech Republic, Joseph Bulova, ignited a series of iconic moments in the nation’s history and transformed how the world perceived time. The visionary opened a small store in downtown New York City, making it his lifelong quest to craft supreme quality time- pieces for an ever-changing and dynamic landscape. He initially specialised in jewellery and repaired clocks and the occasional pocket watch. Around 1911, J. Bulova Company began producing table clocks and pocket watches and, the following year, launched their first plant dedicated to watch production. Joseph revolutionised a standardised mass production at their factory in Biel, Switzerland, which was new to watchmaking. In 1919, the brand presented its first complete watch range for men and then women five years later. In 1927, an observatory was set on the rooftop of 580 5th Avenue to determine universal time precisely. Other accomplishments saw the Accutron, the world’s first fully electronic watch with a proprietary 360-hertz tuning fork tech- nology, become the most accurate in the world at the time. Dur- ing the 1920s and ‘30s, the famous Art Deco watches included Breton in a square or rectangular case, Banker in a tonneau or barrel shape and Commodore in a round case. These models were incorporated into the Joseph Bulova Collection in 2020, utilising Swiss-made Sellita mechanical movements. Bulova’s pioneering spirit changed the face of marketing with America’s first radio and TV commercials called ‘Bulova Watch Time’. The brand also made advancements in the sports world with the Phototimer, a unique combination of photo-finish cam- era and precision electronic timing instrument. They transformed transportation through collaborations with aviator Charles Lind- bergh and on 46 NASA space missions. During the legendary first moonwalk in 1969, a Bulova timer was placed on the Sea of Tran- quility. After Lindbergh became the first man to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic Ocean from New York to Paris, he earned the Bulova Watch Prize of $1,000. He became the face of the brand’s Lone Ea- gle wristwatch, commemorating the record-setting flight. Bulova described the original Lindbergh Lone Eagle as a “handsomely engraved 14-karat white gold filled case with non-breakable crys- tal in the back to protect the movement from dust and a reliable 15-jewel Bulova movement.” With World War II looming in the early 1940s, the United States government commissioned Bulova to produce instruments to aid the American war effort. The brand also created the ‘Hack’ Watch, equipped with a special lockdown apparatus allowing precise syn- chronisation, an asset in planning wartime missions. In the 1950s, the Bulova 23 series with a 23-jewel, self-winding movement fea- tured the industry breakthrough mechanical ‘wrist-alarm’ that would be adopted by other brands. Bulova intrigues Jada Brookes with its pioneering innovations and the remodelled Jet Star timepiece revived from the ‘70s archives.