Breitling

Breitling Strap

Breitling Soaring Above the Sky      

At 20, Leon Breitling was already a watch-maker-craftsman with an extremely impressive talent, and in 1884, he established his own workshop, the predecessor of the Breitling Watch Company. Breitling Watch had kept developing the complex functions of watches as well as manufacturing the chronograph named Breitling. In 1892, Leon moved the factory to Chaux-de-Fonds in Switzerland. In the beginning, Breitling mainly manufactured pocket watches. Since 1914, Breitling had started manufacturing the seconds and luminous watches for armies. In 1915, Breitling created the world’s first chronograph watch. However, Omega claimed that they were the first manufacturer to produce the world’s first chronograph watch. Leon and his son, Gaston, and grandson, Willy, were all infatuated with sports and flying. As a result, this contributed to Breitling’s focuses on developing sports watches and aviation instruments.

Leon and Gaston died in 1914 and 1927 respectively. Willy Breitling took over the Breitling Watch Company in 1932 and he also released the chronograph especially for aviation. On 20th and 21st of May in 1927, Charles Lindbergh made a remarkable achievement by flying the Spirit of St. Louis for 33 hours and 30 minutes from New York to Paris above the Atlantic Ocean. This success had instantly aroused the worldwide passion for aviation. As a result, the aviation reached the prime period of growth.

Willy Breitling realized that there was a huge demand for time precision in aviation and transportation industries. Hence, the Breitling Watch Company had shifted to manufacture the precise timers for panel sets in airplane cabins. Since then, the Breitling Watch Company has entered the path to manufacturing the timers closely linked to aviation. In 1939, British Air signed a significant procurement contract with Breitling Watch Company. Then, other airline companies followed suit. Now, some major aircraft manufacturers such as Boeing, D.W. Douglas and Lockheed Martin are the customers of Breitling Watch Company.

In the aviation history, there had been an intense competition among many mysterious warplanes in 1940s. Many of this second generation of warplanes were equipped with the precise timers produced by the Breitling Watch Company. In order to manifest the close relationship between Breitling Watches and aviation, the Breitling Watch Company established the “Breitling Fighters”, which gathered six most prominent warplanes in World War II, to show the world the spectacle of wars in order to let people see the real super fighter of the legend. In 1952, the headquarters of the Breitling Watch Company was moved to Geneva. But the factory still stayed in Chaux-de-Fonds. After many years dedicated to the watch-making for aviation industry, the Breitling Watch Company launched the most prestigious watch Navitimer in the same year. The launch of Navitimer marked an even more unique significance for all Breitling products. This not only showed the Breitling watches are the perfect timers, it also showed the precious watches have the remarkable ranking for the precise aviation instruments. This made Navitimer gain the reputation of Navigation Computer and contributed to its notable status for pilot watches. 

Dating back to 1941, Breitling Watches had finished the design and the trial production of “Slide Rule” (it can also be called aviation instrument or rotating slide dial). Also, the Slide Rule obtained the Patent 217012 in Switzerland on 30 September 1941. The sliding flying scale refers to the addition of a rotatory circular ring marked with a conversion scale to the outer ring of chronograph. People wearing this watch can do the calculations for aviation by using the rotatory ring of the outer frame and the fixed inner ring of the inner frame. Such an invention contributed to a breakthrough for the functions of watches. Pilots can do the calculations for aviation such as time, speed, distance, fuel consumption, fuel requirements, remaining aviation time, ascending height, ascending speed and ascending time with the help of sliding scale. Since the launch of Slide Rule, there has been a craze for such a precious watch among the professional pilots and the watch fanatics. This led to a significant surge in the sales of Slide Rule. Last but not least, the registered trademark of Breitling “B” in capital letter created by Willy Breitling was not available until 1960. The present trademark of Breitling with the capital letter “B”, the anchor and the wings was finalized later on. Such a logo symbolizes the spirit of Breitling’s three developments in land, sea and air.

**no guarantee about story is completely accurate and existed difference**