Instruments of time

It is 1861 - a year that marked important milestones in world history: A Civil War broke out in the United States of America, which was not only a "War between the States" but also between "old" ways and "new" ways of thinking; Tsar Alexander II. abolished serfdom in Russia; in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the M.I.T. was founded, and in front of the Physics Society of Frankfurt, Germany, Philipp Reis demonstrated the principle of electrical voice transmission, which he had discovered a year earlier: the telephone.

In Germany's Black Forest region, the art of clock-making, still in its infancy, was facing a crisis that became a challenge for a businessman whom the people in this region and beyond would soon call the "inventor of the German watch": Erhard Junghans.

He was a visionary: Erhard Junghans knew that he could only continue this history by meeting challenges with innovation and an open mind for anything new. He was the first of a new type of entrepreneurs who were conservative in their values but not in their thinking. Technological innovations, social achievements, commercial success -- the Junghans name became synonymous with the blessings of a new era, far beyond the limits of Schramberg and the Black Forest. 

In the final two decades of the nineteenth century, the family name, already rich in tradition, became a symbol that was recognized and respected all over the globe. Like clockwork, the brand rose to worldwide fame and recognition. The nineteenth century ended with the spectacular World Fair in Paris - and one of the attractions was a watch from Schramberg that linked past and future, a monumental masterpiece, that managed to excite, enchant, and educate with its mechanical representation of the Passion of the Christ and its elaborate decoration.