Bondtoys.de wrote:The Digital Seikos from the 80s have been far away from being fads.
Digital watches were an '80s fad, regardless of who made them.
The technology was established, incredibly accurate and was a pragmatic, rational choice. Functionwise, there was nothing better than them and Seiko was the best quality available at that time.
Whether those things are true or not has nothing to do with whether or not they were a fad. How many digital watches does Seiko make today? Any? Can you link to some on their current website?
As far as accuracy goes, it has nothing to do with whether or not they are digital ("digital" only references the type of display). The accuracy comes from the underlying time-keeping mechanism. In the case of digital watches, by the time they became a fad, that mechanism was quartz-based, which is more accurate than mechanical movements, and was/is available with both analog and digital display watches.
I knew no one in the '80s in Higgins' age range with a digital watch. My father, grandfather, all of my uncles, great uncles, neighbors, etc., all had analog watches that they'd had for many years or even many decades; Hamiltons, Walthams, Elgins, Bulovas, Gruens, etc. On the other hand, nearly every watch worn by a kid that I went to school with in the '80s was digital, that is, until the "Swatch" fad hit our school in about '86 (those were analog).
Higgins for being a pretty pragmatic person - sometimes - would likely have chosen them.
He wasn't pragmatic to the exclusion of tradition. Most men are quite set in their ways by the time they are in their 50s or 60s, and Higgins came across as someone very set in his ways.
Digital watches were also often looked upon with scorn by the older generation, as a "dumbing down" type of device (sort of in the same way as velcro shoes, another thing I doubt Higgins would have had, despite them being briefly a fad in the '80s). As an example, I remember in 5th grade (1985), a kid named Jeremy asked our teacher, Mr. Maxell, what time it was. Jeremy normally wore a digital watch, but for some reason he wasn't wearing it that day, maybe it was broken. In any event, Mr. Maxell wasn't the coddling type. For example, if anyone asked him how to spell a word, he would point at the dictionary. So for Jeremy, he pointed at the clock on the wall (analog of course). As it turned out, Jeremy couldn't tell time. So, class did not proceed until Jeremy had learned to tell time, and for several weeks thereafter, Mr. Maxell would randomly confirm that Jeremy had retained what he'd learned, by having him look at the clock on the wall and tell him what time it was. Mr. Maxell blamed digital watches for this outrageous oversight in Jeremy's education, and in this case, it was true. Jeremy never had to learn to tell time because he had a digital watch.
As for your gold watches remark: I don't think, that he'd even wear a "fancy gold watch" on special occasions - that was a general remark which included them.
I agree, that he may use a heirloomed pocket watch as well, but don't remember an episode where we can see one.
Most old pocket watches were "fancy gold", at least the ones that became heirlooms (at the very least they were sterling silver). I have one myself; a 14 karat gold-cased Waltham manufactured in 1919, given to me by my grandfather (which still works perfectly by the way). So if you can see him with an heirloom pocket watch, why do you take exception to the idea of him wearing an equivalent wrist watch on certain occasions?