Forgotten Heroes - George Daniels

We're all probably familiar with the Omega CoAxial, i.e. a mechanism with a so-called coaxial escapement, whichOmega advertises as, among other things, minimizing friction, more accurate, requiring less lubrication, and generally better.

It was introduced into mass production in 1999 (older Readers may remember the 1970s series entitled Space 1999, which showed incredible technological achievements at the time, space stations on the Moon and space vehicles like flying cars and many others, and ended with a new movement in Omega) for the deVille model with the 2500 mechanism, but behind this invention is the brilliant watchmaker George Daniels, who invented this new type of escapement in 1975. It is not without reason that I used the word "brilliant" because, apart from the inventive gene, he was one of the few watchmakers who were able to build a watch from scratch on their own, both in terms of design and execution.

George Daniels (source: Daniel Trust Foundation)

He was born in 1926 in the poor interwar period, and his large family lived very modestly, not to say impoverished. He had ten siblings and very quickly had to face the adversities of fate, including unfortunately the brutality of his alcoholic father, who, however, infected him with a technical flair, dealing with, among other things, repairing radios.

Thanks to his own fortitude and tenacity of character, he quickly learned to read, because he believed that only knowledge would give him a chance for a better life. Supposedly, as a six-year-old, he disassembled and reassembled an alarm clock twice, at this point I remembered my first disassembled Soviet alarm clocks in my childhood, unfortunately I didn't know how to assemble them anymore, so today I am the one describing only the history of watch heroes, without being described myself.

Because he had to start working very early, at the age of fourteen he found work in a mattress factory, but in the meantime he was already repairing watches.

Later he took on various jobs, worked as an electrician-mechanic repairing cinema projectors, sold firewood and of course served in the army, where he also tried to move around among officers to acquire the polish of the upper social classes, knowing that both his lack of manners and his characteristic cockney would definitely hinder him in achieving a career (England was governed by specific laws, and the determinants of belonging to a social group were, among other things, accent and pronunciation, cockney is a specific way of speaking that is identified with the inhabitants of poor districts of London)

During his service in 1944-1947, he achieved his first business successes by repairing watches for colleagues and acquaintances, which allowed him to become completely independent from pay, and after completing his service, he used the money he saved to buy his first tools and workshop equipment and began an evening course at the British Horological Institute, after completing which he opened his first workshop in London in 1960. He devoted all his free time to reading books on watchmaking and invested his earned money in his hobby, i.e. vintage cars, which were also the love of his life, apart from watches.

Daniels in his Bentley during the race at Prescott Hill

From the beginning he was fascinated by Abraham Louis Breguet (who we owe the invention of the tourbillon, or cage, thanks to the rotation of which the influence of gravity on the balance was minimized, which resulted in better accuracy of the watch, at a time when it was carried in a pocket in one fairly stabilized position in relation to the force vector of attraction), which was clearly visible in his works, he also became a leading expert on Breguet watches. It is worth mentioning that during his career after writing his first book in 1965, in which a strong emphasis was of course on Breguet watches, he received an offer two years later to take over the Breguet company, which he rejected, arguing that the name "Daniels, London" sounds much better than "Breguet, Paris".

This, of course, did not prevent him from becoming a specialist in the restoration of Breguet watches and publishing the book "The Art of Breguet" in 1975.

"The Art of Breguet" by George Daniels

Thanks to his fascination with cars, he met and befriended the renowned collector and expert, Cecil "Sam" Clutton, who not only introduced Daniels to the "showrooms", introducing him to the establishment of exclusive watches, but also strongly convinced and encouraged him to create expensive handmade watches, rightly believing that this was where George's future lay.

Together, the gentlemen published a book, Watches by Clutton and Daniels, which today is one of the must-haves for every watch enthusiast (it contains two main parts, i.e. historical and technical, describing the history of watchmaking since 1500, as well as watch solutions and models).

"Watches" by Clutton and Daniels

Daniels designed his first pocket watch at Sam's urging and for him in 1969, valuing it at £2,000. It turned out to generate huge interest among his circle of collector friends, by the way, five years later Daniels bought it back for £8,000, and finally this piece was sold at auction in the United States in 2012 for 285,000 USD. How much could it be worth today?

During his life, he designed and created 37 watches, each of which took about 2,500 hours of work, which is easily calculated to be equivalent to one full year of work.

He created personalized watches for selected clients and, as he himself claimed, he never made a watch for someone he didn't care about.

Each of his watches has sold for more than £100,000, and his Space Traveller sold for £3,196,250 in 2017 (it remains on display at London's Science Museum).

Space Traveller watch

He was employed at the famous auction house Sothebys, first as a catalogue photographer and later as an expert.

He was twice awarded the Order of the British Empire by the Queen of England (The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire), which is divided into five classes, including the titles: Knight or Dame Grand Cross of the Order, Knight or Dame Commander of the Order, Commander of the Order, Officer of the Order and Knight of the Order. Holders of the first two classes can use the well-known title of "sir" and the hero of our story belongs to them as CBE (Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire).

In addition, Daniels has also received a number of other honours including membership of the British Horological Institute and receipt of its Gold Medal, and Gold Medals from the City of London and the Master of the Clockmakers Company.

In 1987 he became a member of the prestigious AHCI, the Association of Independent Watchmakers, but there was also a story behind it that was characteristic of the feisty George, because in 1984 he sent a letter to Svend Anderson, one of the founding members of AHCI, it was not just any letter, in a simple yellow envelope with the stamp of Queen Elizabeth there was a handwritten message "I want to join your group".

It is worth noting that three members of this prestigious organization, namely Bernhardt Lederer, Kari Voultilainen and Peter Speake-Marin, were our guests at the annual KMZiZ meetings, which I had the honor and pleasure of organizing.

In 1975, Daniels invented and patented his own first in the watchmaking world, the CoAxial escapement. The patent itself took four years to file.

Although it was an invention on a par with the tourbillon of Master Breguet, unfortunately it remained a dead patent for many years. Daniels traveled to Switzerland many times for nine long years, trying to interest many aces in his solution, such as Patek and Rolex. Unfortunately, he heard a refusal from both President Stern and Andre Heiniger.

Swiss escapement (top), Co-Axial escapement (bottom) (source: Revolution)

In 1982 he independently attempted to install his escapement into the mechanism used in the Patek Philippe Nautilus watch, and in 1985 in the Rolex Datejust.

It was not until 1993, at the initiative of Kilian Eisenegger, the watchmaker from ETA, who contacted Daniels about the possibility of using the escapement in a mass-produced mechanism, that Omega finally purchased the rights to the invention, and this was the beginning of the era of the famous CoAxial mechanisms, which are the brand's speciality.

He worked continuously until the very end, in recent years creating about 8 watches a year together with Roger Smith. His mother, aged 91, apologized to Daniels just before her death for his unhappy childhood and sad home life. Unfortunately, his personal life after his divorce in 1964 was marked by deep sadness due to the loss of contact with his only daughter.

He died in 2011 at the age of 84, leaving behind an estate of around £21 million and a foundation in his name, The George Daniels Educational Trust, which helps poor students gain professional qualifications.

George Daniels was not only the best watchmaker of the 20th century, but a "Renaissance man" in every sense of the word. A writer, designer, inventor, raconteur, rally driver and collector of classic cars, a true self-made man.

Darek Chlastawa