The year is 1958 and the Cold War is in full swing. The United States is losing the space race, seemingly before it’s even begun, and the giddy promise of the Atomic Age has since given way to the fatalistic reality of nuclear holocaust.
Great time to introduce a watch, right? Actually, it was. While 1958 was most definitely a fraught time for geopolitical maneuvering, it also marked an unprecedented initiative that brought together over 67 governments in the name of science to explore the most extreme environments on our planet. Known officially as the International Geophysical Year, the initiative marked the first time since the end of World War II that the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. lowered their guard enough to facilitate an exchange of scientific information. The collaborations that ensued brought us a greater understanding of our planet and its place in the universe.
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And so it was, with numerous scientific initiatives going on across the globe, above it, and beneath the waves, that Jaeger-LeCoultre introduced their now legendary Geophysic chronometer. Like the Rolex Milgauss and IWC’s Ingenieur, the Geophysic was designed from the outset to be a “working” watch, meant as a tool for scientists and explorers, for whom accurate timekeeping was more than a simple luxury — it meant the difference between success and failure. To this end, Jaeger-LeCoultre took a military-spec mechanical movement and proceeded to pack it with the best technology of the day to ensure the utmost in accuracy and reliability. The end result was the manual-wind caliber 478BWSbr, which was modified with a hacking feature to allow for up-to-the-second time synchronization, a Glucydur balance, which provided superior rate stability, a Kif shock absorber, a swan-neck regulator for micrometric adjustment, and finally, a soft-iron inner case to protect the movement from the strong magnetic fields generated during certain scientific experiments and found in the North and South poles.
6 original photos
Today the Geophysic has been reborn in a limited series of watches — 800 in stainless steel ($9,800), 300 in rose gold ($20,800) and 58 in platinum ($32,000) — each of which accurately replicates its forebears in design and intent. Jaeger-LeCoultre chose the New York City headquarters of the fabled Explorer’s Club to officially launch this re-mastered icon, since it was designed precisely for the extreme environments that this club’s illustrious members have charted time and again. Like the original, the Geophysic 1958 can withstand magnetic fields up to 600 gauss (approximately 48,000 A/m magnetic resistance, somewhat less than say, a Rolex Milgauss’s 80,000 A/m resistance, but still impressive), and, in an improvement over its ancestor, is water resistant to 100 meters.
In spite of these rugged attributes, the Geophysic 1958 remains a supremely elegant watch, with a clean dial, lovely sword hands and an understated case. While it has been upsized 3.5mm in diameter to 38.5mm in an effort to better accommodate larger wrists, its proportions remain almost unchanged. Each watch comes mounted on a hand-stitched alligator strap, but as heretical as it may sound to some purists, we’re itching to see one on a nylon NATO strap.