Joseph Fahys

Joseph Fahys (May 28, 1832 – December 11, 1915) was one of the first U.S. watch case manufacturers. After emigrating from France, he went on to establish Joseph Fahys & Co., which at one time was the largest manufacturer of watch cases and one of the largest manufacturers of silverware in the United States. He was also the founder and first president of the Jewelers' Board of Trade, and the first president of the Watchcase Manufacturers' Association.

Early life and education Fahys was born on May 28, 1832, in Belfort, France. He was the son of Joseph and Marianne Moulleseaux Fahys. His father was a contractor; and both his father and brother died when Fahys was young. In company with his mother, he came to New York in March 1848. He apprenticed himself to Ulysse Savoye (1811-1886), of West Hoboken, New Jersey, one of the two first makers of watch cases in the United States. He remained in Savoye's employ for five years, and soon after attaining his majority, began an independent career.

Career Fahys bought out the Savoye business on June 1, 1857. He continued it under his own name and moved the factory to the fourth floor of 75 Nassau Street, New York City before later moving the plant to Carlstadt, New Jersey. In 1861, he formed a connection with Fortenbach Brothers (John, Jacob, and Joseph), which resulted in the building at Carlstadt, one of the first establishments in America which manufactured watch cases on an extensive scale; for five years, business was profitable. In 1867, Fahys located a similar factory in Brooklyn in which he associated with Wheeler, Parsons & Hayes, and the joint enterprise was known as the Brooklyn Watch Case Company. When both factories were well under way, Fahys sold his New York store to Ward & Jennings, two of his employees, and gave his undivided attention to his manufacturing interests. In 1876, he bought the share of the Fortenbach Brothers and moved the Carlstadt plant to Sag Harbor, Long Island. Fahys' son-in-law, Henry Francis Cook, who was president of the Montauk Steamboat Company, became a partner of Fays & Co. in 1880. A year later, he built his own factory in the harbor.

In the 1930s, the Bulova Watch Company took over Fahys' watch factory.

Personal life In 1856, he married a woman from the Hommedieus, an old Sag Harbor family with Huguenot roots. Fahys' Clinton Hill, Brooklyn residences were designed in 1889 and 1890 by Benjamin Wistar Morris III. Morris also designed Fahys' Long Island country house.