Digital Wrist Watches

In 1972, Hamilton produced the first watch with a digital display. They had hinted that they had a new breakthrough as early as 1970 but had two years of teething problems before its 18-carat gold Pulsar hit the world at a price of $2,100. By pressing a button on the side, the time was displayed on a red numeric display, caused by a light emitting diode (LED) display. Hamilton had provided a brief glimpse into the future in Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey when the company provided the futuristic digital clock that featured in the film. John Bergey who was head of Hamilton's Pulsar division said that this had inspired his team with the vision for their new timepiece which was then in development.

The LED is created by passing a electric charge through inorganic materials. Seven electronic switches went into making each of the numerals on the display. The original red light was generated by using aluminium gallium arsenide (AlGaAs), however Pulsar later produced a green LED using gallium nitride (GaN).

Many in the industry began to believe that the new quartz analogue watches would even be doomed to extinction so soon after their arrival that it wasn't worth buying into the trend, something which was reflected in the writings of Douglas Adams and other contemporary writers at the end of the 1970s and start of the 1980s.

Before the watch companies could 'do away with' the analogue watch though, they first had to bring down the price of the digital successor. Competition in the digital field increased and by 1975 there were over 80 varieties available. This competition helped to bring prices down but the product was still out of the range of the average consumer.

Digital watches even in the late 1970s still necessitated two hands - one to wear the watch and the other to press the button to turn on the LED display. The reason for this was that LED used up a high amount of the available power from the small power cell that could be fitted into the casing. The next innovation in digital watches would free up one hand for time keeping in a way not seen since the wristwatch replaced the pocketwatch.

Liquid Crystal Display first became possible in 1972 with the invention of the Twisted Nematic Liquid Crystal Display (TNLCD), following decades of research into liquid crystals at Hull University. It allowed a lower power level to reflect light onto a passive screen. However, this first breakthrough proved impractical due to the lack of photochemically and chemically stable nematic materials in existence in liquid-crystal form at room temperature1. A year later this problem was overcome when scientists discovered that a crystal known as cyano-biphenyl, could be made to change from one form to another near room temperature; these then were used in LCDs. They were first used in calculators in 1972 but the displays were still too big for watches.

However, by 1973 Seiko yet again led the way, this time with the first watch to utilise LCD technology. It had a six figure display. As LCD used less power than LED, the display was permanent, thus allowing for the addition of seconds to the display.

The Swiss finally embraced quartz technology but left the digital field to the Japanese and Americans settling instead to make elegant analogue quartz watches.