91av

IN 1964, reaching for the nearest national stereotype lying around, 91av described Switzerland as “remarkably accomplished in the manufacture of a mechanism”. That mechanism was, of course, the wristwatch. Traditional Swiss watchmaking was under threat. Despite 400 years of expertise and wind-up watches with an accuracy of better than 1 part in 20,000, the Swiss were worried about the Accutron and its successors.

The Accutron was the world’s first successful electronic watch, and devised by a turncoat Swiss to boot: electronics engineer Max Hetzel. It had spawned successors in other nations, putting Swiss exports and timepiece predominance under threat. Centuries of expertise with miniaturised cogs and springs looked like being usurped. But the had words of reassurance for the Swiss. We declared that “once a certain conservatism has been overcome, the Swiss watch industry is going to emerge as formidable competition in these advanced technologies”.

We were equally bullish about another product frequently associated with one nation. Korean ginseng, we announced in our , was as stimulating as cannabis. It “stimulates every conceivable aspect of protein and nucleic acid metabolism”, we said. However, despite our enthusiasm, we didn’t go on to say what benefits this might have for humankind.

Perhaps it could have been used to stimulate British industry. Our Feedback column in the contained a theory that innovation was being stymied because not enough people could get hold of our magazine. An engineer acquaintance of a staff member recalled receiving copies of 91av in his company office, “but management cancelled the subscription”, he bemoaned. On being asked why, he replied that his colleagues had “spent too much time reading it”. If they had only had accurate watches with which to time their tea breaks.