Sedalia, Mo. ? Even though Einstein’s theory says that time is relative to an event, a horrible train crash near Cleveland in 1891 demonstrated that knowing the exact time was of absolute importance to railway safety.

Knowing the time could have avoided that event.

The collision happened because an engineer’s watch was four minutes slow and he failed to switch his train to a siding so a fast-moving mail train could pass, according to Ehrhardt & Meggers American Pocket Watch Identification and Price Guide.

Both engineers and nine other people died in an accident that could have been avoided, if engineers and conductors had carried reliable watches set to railroad time.

From that crash came the General Railroad Timepiece Standards, adopted in 1893, which demand that engineers and conductors carry watches guaranteed to be accurate within 30 seconds over a week’s time.

Spicing up a hobby

Those regulations are added spice to the hobby of Leo Groseclose, 78, of Windsor. Groseclose is a pocket watch collector, and “railroad watches” make up a portion of his hundreds of timepieces.

“I love all kinds of pocket watches, from the tiny women’s watches on up,” said Groseclose, a retired chemist and bacteriologist.

In his collection, he also has dress watches, made to be worn with a Sunday suit, and many hunter case watches, which have a metal cover that closes over the glass crystal to protect it from breaking.

“It’s the regulations that make the railroad watches interesting,” he said.

A portion of the collection of pocket watches belonging to Leo Groseclose, of Windsor, Mo., which includes both open face and hunter case timepieces, is shown April 21.

The rules caused American watchmakers to refine their works to a quality never before reached anywhere in the world.

“That’s history,” he said, “and America’s young people should know that and be proud of it.”

Sharing history

Groseclose is eager to share his knowledge with interested people and often dresses in early 1900s clothing, complete with derby hat, to talk to groups about his hobby.

“Today most of us wear a quartz watch and, once you put a battery in it and set it, we expect it to be accurate within a second or two over the life of the battery,” he said.

He said people look at Swiss watches as the finest in the world, but “all the Swiss did was take the American standards and refine them even further.”

Groseclose said his father was a jeweler and watchmaker. He inherited a share in a Las Cruces, N.M., jewelry shop when his father died.

“I went and took a watchmaking course, thinking about joining the business, but afterward decided on a different career,” he said.

With degrees in chemistry and bacteriology from Kansas University, he worked in water treatment and waste treatment in Kansas City, Mo., and St. Louis, where he retired in 1989 before moving to Windsor in 1990.

‘Part of our heritage’

He began collecting watches in 1980. With his training and interest, Groseclose can usually diagnose a problem with a watch and knows where to send one to be fixed.

“If you don’t know a good bit about watches, you end up buying a lot of bum ones at sales and auctions,” he said.

“Whenever I do a talk, there’s usually a few people who have their dad’s or granddad’s watch with them and want to know about them,” he said.

“I try to answer their questions and tell them about how much the watch is worth and how to take care of it,” the collector said. “Again, it’s part of our heritage.”

‘So many memories’

John Kehde, a Sedalia restaurant owner, is a railroad buff, who collects all sorts of railroad memorabilia. He said he doesn’t get too involved with railroad watches because they are so specialized. What he does know is that railroad watches are getting more expensive and more difficult to find.

There once were many railroad watches in Sedalia because of its heritage as a railroad town.

“A lot of good watches were sold for the value of the gold or silver in the case around 1980 when the prices of gold and silver went so high,” Kehde said. “And the price of gold is on the rise again now.”

Skip Bay, a Sedalia auctioneer, said he loves to get pocket watches, and especially railroad watches, in consignments and estates.

“If they’re in good shape, they always bring good money,” he said. “They’re so personal. A lot of times they are the one thing a widow doesn’t want to sell. There are so many memories tied up in that palm-sized timepiece,” he said.