Elgin Advertising, 1921

The Elgin of Today

"Time goes, you say?  Ah no.  Alas, Time stays: we go!"

Charles Henry Hulburd, Elgin's third President, who has headed this great organization for nearly  a quarter century

Never in world's history has the value of Time been so widely recognized as today.

"A man is known by the Elgin he carries" - business and social leaders are known by the value they put on their Time.  The more precious a commodity, the finer the safeguards for its measurement and control.

In the great Elgin factory of today, the original Elgin working principle is steadfastly maintained - "all parts interchangeable."  The standardized parts of the modern Elgin are instantly available at the repair bench of the nearest Jeweler.

Thus guesswork has been replaced by precision - the Sun Dial of ancient Babylon by those timekeeping marvels of today -

Elgin Watches

The $250 Corsican * Material, construction, adjustment and service fully covered by Elgin Guarantee *

Elgin Advertising, 1922

The Value of Time

By Kronos

Paintings by HAROLD DELAY

Richard the Lion-Hearted - "mightiest warrior and hardest working Crusader in all Christendom" - knew the Value of Time.

For two long years the city of Acre, near Jerusalem, had defied the besieging Crusaders - yet its walls trembled when Richard anchored off the Syrian shore.  Lion-Heart's great hour had come at last.  So clear was his vision of Time as his ally that he arose from a sick-bed, was carried to the trenches on a litter, and with his own sword hewed the fortress from the infidel's grip.

Over the Time of the Crusaders, the Saracen water clock stood guard.  But the modern world, enriched by experience, intrusts life's costliest possession to those marvels of accuracy which human ingenuity and skill now place within the reach of all -

Elgin Watches

Four popular new lines (12 size) created by Elgin designers: material, construction, adjustments and service fully covered by Elgin Guarantee

New Streamline Series: Specially designed for a wide variety of tastes - $35 to $100. 

New Classic Series: Two thin models.  Lord Elgin movement: $150.

New Corsican Series: Three models, Lord Elgin movements, $175.

New Presentation Series: "The last word in the Gift Idea."  C. H. Hulburd moveemnt, $300 to $500.

Elgin Advertising, 1921

The First Watch Factory

For three centuries after the first "pocket clock," watchmaking remained a one-man industry.  The made the cost prohibitive, except for the wealthy few.

But up in the snow-capped mountains of Switzerland a modern manufacturing idea was stirring - the principle of specialized labor.  By 1840 this idea had assumed factory proportions.  The first factory building was a mere assembly plant - the real factory was the mountaineer's home.  Here all hands specialized in shaping or finishing some one watch part, under the guidance of the manufacturer.

As everything was hand work, aided only by the fiddle-bow lathe, no two parts were precisely alike.  A broken watch went back to the maker of the broken part for repair.

Not an ideal manufacturing situation - yet a long upward step toward organized production of our day which has made possible those marvels of standardized, interchangeable construction -

Elgin Watches

Elgin Advertising, 1926

One of a series of little biographies of Elgin Watches

...WRITTEN BY EMINENT ELGINEERS

A truly great product is one that gives the buyer more than he has a right to expect.  I have found the Elgin Watch to be that kind of product.

My first Elgin was a gift of my father and mother - presented to me when I graduated from High School thirty-eight years ago.  It was guaranteed for twenty years.  But it served me faithfully for twenty-eight years - almost a decade beyond its guarantee.

It was keeping perfect time when I retired it - but I wanted a lighter, open face watch.

My present Elgin is a Corsican Model - a beautifully thin, almost wafer-like watch that exemplifies the new-day manufacturing principle of maximum efficiency with minimum bulk.

by H. S. FIRESTONE

ELGIN

THE WATCH WORD FOR ELEGANCE & EFFICIENCY

Elgin Advertising, 1922

The Value of Time

By Kronos

Paintings by 

HAROLD DELAY

"Time," cried Plato to the men of Athens, "is the gift of the gods - the movable image of Eternity!"

Plato saw Tim as the great companion, guiding human life through the fleeting years to its home on "the luminous slopes of the stars."

"The Creator" he said, "brought into being the sun, earth, moon and the five other stars we call planets, to distinguish and safeguard the appointment of Time.  To this universe He allotted souls equal in  number to all the stars in the heavens - that each soul, after living out his appointed Time, might return to his own star."

From this Year of our Lord 1922, with its watchwords of "Efficiency" and "Power of Will" as guideposts to success, the historians trace back to Plato the first definite expression of the Will-Plan of life.

He who would lay hold on his life, dominating instead of drifting, must lay hold on his Time - by resolutely safeguarding the golden hours of Now:

"Time was is past; thous canst it recall.

Time is thou hast; emply thy portion small.

Time future is not, and may never be -

Time present is the only Tim for thee!"

Over the Time of the ancients, the sun and moon kept watch.  But the Twentieth Century, more richy endowed, intrusts life's costliest possession to these marvels which bring to us the accumulated experience of all the ages -

Elgin Watches

Elgin Advertising, 1925

An engineer made him an Elgineer on his twenty-first birthday
One of a series of little biographies of Elgin Watches

Everyone knows what a watch means to a railroad man.  My father - a locomotive engineer in the days of wood-burning locomotives in the West - taught me how to read time almost before I learned the alphabet.

On my twenty-first birthday, he gave me an Elgin Watch and to a railroad man, the son of a railroad man, no finer gift could have been given.

During many years of railroad service, I worked by this Elgin.  Long after its heavy hunting case design went out of style, it remained dear to me.

Today I carry a modern Elgin - a Corsican model.  But the old watch still means much to me, the gift of a father to a son, a remembrance of railroad days.

- by Walter P. Chrysler

ELGIN

THE WATCH WORD FOR ELEGANCE AND EFFICIENCY 

Elgin Advertising, 1921

The Chronometer

Modern Navigation dates from 1762, when John Harrison's Chronometer reached the West Indies, after a voyage of sixty-one days, with an error of only five seconds.

The rich prize which Parliament had offered for half a century - twenty thousand pounds sterling - went to Harrison.  His victory, after thirty years of struggle, hinged on his previous invention of the Compensating Pendulum.

Unlike the modern ship's-watch, his timepiece was not suspended in gimbals but carried on a pillow.

The world war set new standards in naval timekeeping.  The torpedo boat, with its terrific vibration, baffled America's experts till Elgin railroad watches were adapted to the service,  And the first acceptable ship's-watches supplied our navy in quantities sufficient to equip the U. S. Emergency Fleets were - as might have been expected -

Elgin Watches

The $150 Corsican in yellow gold - Three fifths actual size - An unretouched photograph