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The Watch Enthusiast #11 June 2004

The Watch Enthusiast July 2004

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The Watch Enthusiast

July 2004

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In this Issue
Welcome! Rare Tiffany Movement Vacheron Constantin and Verger Frères Doctors' Watches	Musings Helpful Resources Questions and Answers Subscribe / Unsubscribe

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1. Welcome! Welcome to the July 2004 issue of The Watch Enthusiast. The Watch Enthusiast is a free monthly newsletter about watch collecting. Our goal is to provide:

Original articles about the enjoyment of collecting and wearing wrist and pocket watches.
Up to date information based on reliable sources.

In this issue, I’m featuring a couple of pieces that I recently acquired based on my trust your instincts/ be brave rules for collecting on a budget from the last two issues. I have since done my research and am very happy with trusting my instincts. Please let me know if there is a particular watch or style of watch that you would like to see discussed in future articles.

2. Rare Tiffany Movement

I saw this at the morning preview for an afternoon auction. I had never seen such a movement before with a most unusual regulator and the fact that it was lever set from the back. Since I had never seen such a movement, I paid a little more than usual for a high-grade open face Tiffany pocket watch.

What did my after-purchase research show? Based on the serial number and shape of the movement plates, this watch was actually produced by Tiffany in the short period of time (1874-1879) when Tiffany had its own watch factory in Geneva. Tiffany produced around 12,000 finished watches during this period. I found another Tiffany produced pocket watch where this particular regulator was used.

...more detail...

Similar regulators can occasionally be found in Agassiz and Patek Philippe pocket watches. While I’m still searching for an equivalent piece with a back lever set mechanism, it is clear that this is a rare watch actually produced by Tiffany.

3. Vacheron Constantin and Verger Frères Here is an instance when it was correct not to follow the rule that Swiss pocket watches should be triple-signed by the maker. In this situation, Vacheron Constantin made the watchworks while the case was made by Verger Frères of France. I acquired this piece because it was a stunning Art Deco piece with a high-grade watch.
... More detail ...	I was pleased with the results of my after-purchase research. Verger Frères was a top jewelry maker which produced wonderful pieces under its own name as well as for Boucheron, Cartier, Gubelin, Tiffany and Van Cleef & Arpels. It also produced specialty watch and clock cases and often worked with Vacheron Constantin on such pieces. In fact, a couple of the top pieces at Antiquorum’s Geneva 30th Anniversary sale in April were case by Verger and watchworks by Vacheron Constantin.
Many of the unusual and very well made watch cases will not have been made by the watchmaker, but by a specialty casemaker. For unusual pieces, like this Verger Art Deco case or any of the chased designed cases, the fact that the case is signed by the casemaker will not affect the value of the watch. However, a watch with basic case signed by the casemaker will realize less than the equivalent piece when the signature on the case is the watchmaker’s.

4. Doctors’ Watches What exactly is a “Doctor’s Watch?” A doctor needs a watch with an easy to read second hand in order to take a patient’s pulse. Logic would then say that a doctor’s watch would be any watch that enables a doctor to easily read seconds. However, when collecting is involved, logic and common sense do not always apply. For example, a sweep second hand watch (second hand sweeps entire watch dial) would serve a doctor’s purpose, but is not considered a “Doctor’s Watch” for watch collecting purposes. For the watch collector, a “Doctor’s Watch” is a watch with a large seconds subdial that is separate from and nearly the size of the hour/minute dial.

This type of dial goes back to the 1700s. However, the most famous Doctor’s Watch was the Rolex Prince. The Prince was originally made at the Aegler factory which produced similar watches for other watch companies, particularly Gruen. At the time Aegler was partly owned by Rolex, Gruen and the Aegler family who ran the factory. Gruen sold these pieces under the style name Techni-Quadron, which one can guess by its name was also heavily marketed to engineers. Most recent “Doctor’s Watches” are practical in nature, thus collectors generally focus on the pieces from the 1920s-1940s that combined style with the practical needs of doctors and engineers.

...more detail...

5. Musings... As you can see from the Tiffany and Vacheron, part of the fun of collecting is taking educated chances. The longer you focus on a collecting area, the more likely it is that your educated risks will do far better than the best Wall Streeter’s stock picks. Have fun, take risks, but don’t bet the farm (or nest egg, etc.)

Please provide your comments about this newsletter and let me know if there is any watch collecting area you would like to see explored in this newsletter.

Remember that collecting anything should be fun. Especially when you can actually wear part of your collection and be able to enjoy its presence by just checking the time. If you collect keywinds, you may find it fun to occasionally wear one and watch the reaction when you take out the key and wind it. (You’ll be amazed how many people will notice).

6. Helpful Resources
There is a well done British site, Horologia, which has a lot of great information on English pieces and a very good links page. http://www.horologia.co.uk/ That site even has a picture of an early verge fusee doctors’ watch http://www.horologia.co.uk/doctorsverge.html

There is a collector’s organization, called the American Watch Company, whose site offers many pictures and some ongoing commentary. This organization, whose membership overlaps the National Association of Watch And Clock Collector membership can be found at http://www.tommythejoat.com/

7. Questions and Answers
? Question: I have been trying to get the circa on a Tiffany pocket watch for about two years now. How do I determine the vintage of a Tiffany watch? ! Answer: The limited production of watches by Tiffany and the variety of makers that produced watches for Tiffany make it difficult to determine when a watch was made.
Many producers made timepieces for Tiffany from Hamilton and Longines (exampls to right), through Agassiz and International Watch Company up to Audemars Piguet (example to right) and Patek Philippe. (Also see issue #3 September 2003 on this subject). To determine the pieces age, you have to first determine who was the underlying maker. First, check for hallmarks on the case – if you see Swiss hallmarks (Lady’s profile for 18k and a squirrel for 14k) you will not have to look at American pieces. Then you need to review the various watch movement books and/or take the piece to a watchmaker who primarily repairs high-grade pocket watches to identify the actual maker of the watch. Once you have identified the maker, then the easy part is cross-referencing the serial number to the maker’s production list giving you the date the movement was originally produced. However, there may be years between when the movement was made and when the piece was first sold. For major pieces, the Tiffany archivist should be of assistance. Additionally, if the piece was made by one of the major Swiss makers still in existence, you can get an archival history of the watch from the maker (there is a fee).	Longines Tiffany Watch Audemars Piguet Tiffany Watch

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Thank you for reading!

If you have questions about watches or watch collecting, please forward to huck@tias.com. We will not respond to questions solely about value of a particular watch. For an estimate, discuss with watch friends, check with a local appraiser or auction houses or, on the web, try http://www.kovel.com for a price book or http://www.whatsitworthtoyou.com/tias.htm for an online appraisal.

Please e-mail Huck@Tias.com with any comments or if you would like to write a short note for this newsletter. Also, please let me know if there are any items that you would like me to search for free to forward this to a friend. To subscribe to this or other TIAS newsletters, especially The Cuff Linker for which I'm also the editor and primary author, go to http://www.tias.com/subscribe

Please let me know your thoughts on how my store or our mall can be adjusted to make finding the type of cuff links that you are searching for easier and your overall browsing experience more pleasurable!

I'm still hopeful that some of you will write in with your own collectors' creeds. If you have particular rules that you have followed to a fun collection, please write in so they can be passed on to everyone.

Thank you for reading! Please feel free to forward this to a friend.

Paul G. Huck
email: Huck@Tias.com
website: http://captainhucksbooty.com