Breitling Chronomat

In 1941, Breitling applied for a patent for a unique watch that would herald things to come. The patent—number 217012—was for a watch that featured a rotating slide rule on the bezel. The fact that it had a slide rule was by no means unusual, or even unprecedented. Actually, another brand, Mimo, had put out a watch with a slide rule the previous year. However, the patent filed by Breitling would be unique in that the slide rule would be combined with a chronograph.  Breitling released the Chronomat in 1942, at the height of the Second World War. Compared with the spartan, black-dialed chronographs destined for military use, the Chronomat seemed—visually and technically—the antithesis of military watches. Rather than an instrument of war, it was meant to be an instrument of peace, once the trumpets of war ceased to sound and swords were beaten to ploughshares. It was conceived and then promoted as a watch for scientists, engineers, mathematicians. Rather than calculate bomb strikes or t