ROLEX AND DAYTONA HISTORICAL MILESTONES

First Certificate Of Chronometric Precision

By 1910, Rolex had already created a wristwatch designed to pass chronometer testing at the Official Watch Rating Center in Bienne, Switzerland. Soon after, a Rolex wristwatch was awarded the Class A certificate at the Kew Observatory in London. At the time, such an honor was reserved mainly for marine chronometers, and to achieve recognition of this kind for a small wristwatch was an incredible feat. This achievement would be an overarching standard for all Rolexes to come, with chronometric precision and excellence in wristwatches being one of Hans Wilsdorf’s most important goals.

Hans Wilsdorf was indeed a visionary when he said: “My personal opinion... is that pocket watches will almost completely disappear and that wristwatches will replace them definitively! I am not mistaken in this opinion and you will see that I am right.”

No truer words could have been said, and following World War II, wristwatches had almost become de rigueur, with pocket watches becoming more and more niche.

The first milestone is reached: PRECISION.

In 1910, the first certificate of chronometric precision for a wristwatch was granted to a Rolex, delivered by the official Official Watch Rating Centre (Bureaux Officiels Communaux pour l’Observation des Mon- tres) in Bienne, Switzerland. In 1914, Rolex received a “Class A Certificate of Precision” from the National Physical Laboratory (GB) at Kew Observatory, one of the oldest metrology institutes in the world.