Towson Watch Company was founded at the beginning of the new millennium in 2000 by two engineers with a passion for mechanical timepieces. After 40 years of experience repairing complicated, delicate and historic timepieces, our founding master horologist, George Thomas, met his partner, Hartwig Balke, a graduate in mechanical engineering and talented designer. In an Irish Pub in Annapolis after sailors’ small talk, Thomas and Balke soon discovered their common love for high grade mechanical watches.

Towson Watch Company is one of the oldest American-owned mechanical watch firms that still exists today, having been founded by Hartwig Balke & George Thomas in 1998. The master watchmakers moved to America in their early retirement, first conceiving the company together at a sailor's pub in Annapolis, MD. Hartwig brought his expertise as an engineer and George as a horologist. They sailed the Chesapeake Bay while rapidly developing the Towson Watch Brand, and unknowingly, the Chesapeake Collection that would come close to a decade later in 2010.