Vallée de Joux

The Historical Dictionary of Switzerland describes a long valley above 1,000 metres in the Vaud Jura, around the lakes of Joux, Brenet and Ter; its people are called Combiers. It had three communes, L'Abbaye, Le Chenit (with Le Sentier and Le Brassus) and Le Lieu.¹

The valley was nearly self-sufficient until the 18th century; poor farming was supplemented by forests, cheese and ironworks driven by water power, with blast furnaces from as early as the 15th century.^1, 3

The Historical Dictionary of Switzerland counts 4,783 people in the valley in 1850, 6,307 in 1900 and 7,708 in 1970.¹

According to the Historical Dictionary of Switzerland, skill with iron led, from the 18th century, to music boxes, gem-cutting and watch parts, and to families specialising in grand complications: Audemars, Breguet, LeCoultre, Meylan, Piguet.¹

The first watchmaker of the valley, according to Audemars Piguet's historians, was Samuel Olivier Meylan, who learned the trade at Rolle from 1740 and taught others at home; the valley won an exemption from Bern in 1749, had its own guild from 1756 and lost it in 1776.³

Farmers made watch parts in winter. Audemars Piguet's museum describes them producing wheels, bridges, springs, jewels and pinions in the long winter months; the Espace Horloger of Le Sentier presents the same "farmer-watchmakers" as the root of the valley's skill.^6, 7

When the snow melted, watchmakers carried the winter's work to Geneva on foot or on horseback, according to Audemars Piguet.³

Louis-Benjamin Audemars took over Philippe-Samuel Meylan's workshop at Le Brassus in 1811, when Meylan left to found Piguet & Meylan in Geneva; his firm, Louis Audemars & Fils, was the largest in Le Brassus between 1850 and 1880 and is said to have employed up to 180 home workers in 1833.³

Jaeger-LeCoultre says Antoine LeCoultre set up his workshop at Le Sentier in 1833.⁴

The "Merveilleuse", a watch with 25 complications shown at the Paris exhibition of 1878, was made by Charles Ami Lecoultre, Louis Elisée Piguet and Eugène Rodolphe Capt, and is in the Musée international d'horlogerie at La Chaux-de-Fonds, according to Audemars Piguet.³

The Espace Horloger says Zenith of Le Locle opened a factory at Le Sentier in 1917; it became LeCoultre's in 1927 and now houses the Espace Horloger museum (founded 1994, opened 1996).⁷

An industrial college opened in 1894 and became the watch school of Le Sentier, today the École technique de la Vallée de Joux.^1, 7

The Historical Dictionary of Switzerland says railways ended the isolation: a line from Vallorbe to Le Pont in 1886, built on the back of the ice trade from the frozen lakes, reached Le Brassus in 1899.¹