Not something I'd thought about. "Most societies, as far back as the Egyptians if not further, have had some mechanism for keeping time – sundials, water clocks, hourglasses – but those were fixed in place. By the 15th century, however, the development of the spring-driven clock meant that timekeepers could be freed from their moorings; there is some evidence of people wearing proto-pocket watches around their necks, a la Flava Flav. Through the 18th and 19th centuries, portable time-telling was largely the province of the pocket watch; if a timepiece appeared on a wrist, then it was a lady’s wrist, and it was considered more a piece of jewelry than an item of function. Exactly when the wristwatch was invented and by whom is unclear. The Guinness Book of World Records gives luxury watchmakers Patek Philippe credit for the first wristwatch, designed for the Countess Koscowicz of Hungary in 1868. But the venerable Guinness has been known to be wrong before, and there are records of other bracelet-style watches that pre-date the Patek Philippe model, including one designed and manufactured by Breguet for the Queen of Naples in 1810 (well, ordered in 1810 – it wasn’t delivered until 1812). Queen Elizabeth I was supposed to have been given a watch set into a bracelet by Robert Dudley in 1571, which would have made her vastly ahead of fashion, but the item hasn’t survived. In any case, the ladies’ wristwatch, often called a “bracelet watch”, a “montre bracelet”, or a “wristlet”, existed for at least a century, if not longer, before its widespread adoption by the general public and by men at all. Why? Firstly, watches were still somewhat delicate and a timepiece on one’s wrist could be guaranteed some shocks; these wristwatches, dripping with precious stones, were absolutely fashion first and function second. That they were so delicate probably reveals more about the women who were wearing them – that they may have been perceived to be as ornamental as the watches themselves. Which makes it a little ironic, then, that what really drove the design and adoption of the wristwatch was war. Accurate timekeeping is essential on the battlefield. “You can track back a number of errors in war to timing,” said military historian Peter Doyle, author of The First World War in 100 Objects. But a pocket watch, however accurate it was, was somewhat unwieldy, especially as styles of warfare shifted from the Napoleonic – two armies facing off on a large field – to modern artillery-heavy, sometimes guerilla warfare. The first wristwatches designed for military use actually came in 1880: After one of his naval officers complained to his superiors that timing bombardments was too difficult with a pocket watch, Kaiser Wilhelm I commissioned Swiss watchmakers Girard-Perregaux to design and manufacture a watch mounted on a wrist strap. The Girard-Perregaux watches weren’t terribly different from how wristwatches appear now, with the exception of the thick metal grill protecting the glass face. Though the wristwatches were indeed more practical in battle conditions, they weren’t popular with men in the main and the design was discontinued. Roughly 20 years later, wristwatches were adopted by soldiers fighting in the Boer War in South Africa – some sported leather wrist straps into which a gentleman could put his pocket watch – but again, they didn’t receive widespread attention. Even at the war’s end in 1902, a redesign of the British officers’ uniforms still came with a pocket for their pocket watch. The problem was twofold: Firstly, wristwatches weren’t considered to be as reliable as pocket watches, owing to the fact that they were jostled about a good deal more. And secondly, wristwatches, though practical, still had the whiff of womanliness about them: “The sort peer pressure would be, ‘Why are you wearing that, that’s a woman’s thing,’” explained Doyle. It would take a global war to catapult the wristwatch onto the arms of men the world over. Though the wristwatch wasn’t exactly invented for World War I, it was during this era that it evolved from a useful but fringe piece of military kit to a nearly universal necessity. So why this war? Firstly, the development of the wristwatch was hastened by the style of warfare that soon became symbolic of the First World War: The trenches. “The problem with the pocket watch is that you have to hold it,” explained Doyle. That wasn’t going to work for the officer at the Western Front – when an officer lead his men “over the top”, leaving the relative safety of the trenches for the pock-marked no man’s land in between and very possible death, he had his gun in one hand and his whistle in the other. “You haven’t got another hand in which to hold your watch.” As in the Boer War, some men had taken to strapping their pocket watches to their wrists, but this was cumbersome and heavy. At the same time, technological advancements were making hardier timepieces. Several watchmakers, including Cartier and Rolex, had already been experimenting with watches that strapped to the wrist; Cartier, for example, had already begun marketing a watch that the company’s principal, Louis Cartier, designed for Brazilian aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont in 1911 (Cartier still makes and sells a version of the watch). These watchmakers – and many others, including Omega and Longines – saw their moment and began manufacturing watches specifically for the military market. Indeed, the first use of the word “wristwatch” in paper of record The New York Times, is in a 1915 report from the annual meeting of the National Retail Jewelers’ Association, which featured a presentation of wristwatches “for soldiers” with radium dials “so that the soldier can tell the time in the darkest night”, as well as a compass. (Notably, subsequent mentions of “wristwatch” in The New York Times over the next few decades refer primarily to them being stolen.) As the war ground on, more and more officers adopted wristwatches. “It’s small, portable, it’s essential, it’s important,” he said. “The wristwatch became something that men would wear because it was practical.”" http://boingboing.net/2015/03/04/how-wwi-made-wristwatches-happ.html
