Marathon Watch Company of Canada has manufactured Military Watches, Clocks, and time keeping devices for some time. Often it's products are coveted by collectors since they are normally contracting small production runs, and sales are restricted to various government agencies. Here is an example of a mechanical military alarm clock.

Marathon alarm clock.

Back of clock. (Not the best of images)

Nice little clock, Matt.

Does it have a military ownership mark?

What sort of Marathon products have you seen - do their products go back as far as WWII, or are they more recent?

Thanks,

Greg

No military markings except the red 24 hour dial. I suppose it could be railroad instead of military...or just a 24 hour marker dial for the general public. Marathon Watch Company Ltd. was established in 1939. I'm still doing research on their military contracts, but it seems that mid-1980's was some of the first military watches. They also manufacture many other types of timers and clocks. Today, they are the sole supplier of military wrist watches to the U.S. Government.

Has Stocker & Yale dropped out of the loop of U.S. military watch contracts? I have not kept up as much with the modern stuff.

Best regards,

Greg

Stocker & Yale, from what I have read, has not been competitive in the bid process. What is interesting about the modern stuff is that commercial off-the-shelf items that are available to the general public increasingly meet the requirement for Mil-Spec rated equipment. The modern U.S. military contracted issue watches may soon be found too be an expensive acquisition option. The amount of watches contracted by the U.S. Government pales in comparison to the numbers requisitioned in Vietnam, Korea, and WWII, making them instant "limited editions". The good ones are very rarely accessible to the average service member for various reasons.

The featured clock is a masterpiece in my opinion, due to the quality and utility of the clock. http://www.countycomm.com/clock.htm This clock traces back to the Stemberk.

Marathon makes a nice watch with a black composite material case (some kind of super dense nylon-like stuff) called the Navigator that is the current US military issue wristwatch. The nice thing about these is not only their relative quality for the price but especially their having tiny glass tubes filled with tritium and phosphorus inlaid at each hour marking and more tubes inlaid in the hands. What this means is it is really easy to read the time in the dark as these little tubes glow like crazy 24 hours a day and they do not need to be exposed to the light to "recharge" them like ordinary luminous material does. There are a couple of places that get their hands on military production overruns and sell them to the public. Countycomm is one of these but since these Marathon Navigator's are just overruns of real military contracts their supply from Marathon is spotty and you have to buy when they are in stock. If you find them on Ebay, you should check to make sure you are getting a recent production one as the tritium has a half-life of 12 years and if you get an old one it will not give you the same life of the "glow" that a new one will. I wear one of these Navigators as my everyday watch so that the pilot's watch I was issued many moons ago doesn't get worn out. By the way, the radioactivity in the tritium is really tiny and nothing to worry about. It is only alpha particles which can't even get through the watch case or crystal much less the very top of your skin. A piece of paper will block it.

The little clock is tempting. It would go well with my old pressed paper case, "War Alarm" of WWII vintage.



Interesting stuff, tritium!

I have an unissued "Autoranging Chronograph" fitted with tritium tubes, but given that it's from the 1980's the tubes are long dead.

I have considered looking for replacement tritium tubes some day. But, how do-able is it to find and pay for replacement tritium tubes?

Best regards,

Greg

The Countycomm.com, from what I understand, is able to do this. By the way, they may have one or two of the alarm clocks left that were found in a warehouse...

From what I understand you need a special license from the government to buy deal in tritium since it is radioactive - very mildly, but radioactive non the less. Let us know if Countycomm does this service.

I recommend that you contact them directly using the contact information on their website. They seem very responsive to inquiries. www.countycomm.com