From k_singer@knology.net Thu Mar 13 18:39:28 2003 Date: Sun, 9 Feb 2003 18:06:55 -0500 From: Kent Singer To: "Josh (Norm) Audette" Subject: Re: Railroad watch Hi Norm: Congratulations! Your father's watch is a very nice high-grade railroad watch, grade (or caliber 435B). The movement was built in the 1950's by the Record Watch Company of Switzerland, under contract to The Ball Company, a U.S. firm with offices in Cleveland (Ohio), Chicago and San Francisco. Since you used the picture from the internet article "Just What Is A Railroad Watch?" at the NAWCC Chapter 174 Pocket Horology website (http://www.pockethorology.org/), I gather you understand what a railroad watch really is (well, perhaps as well as they can be understood). The Ball watches are considered a cut above the run-of-the-mill railroad grade watches and the Official RR Standard grade watches are considered to be collectable, although the Swiss-built Ball watches not collected as avidly as the U.S.-built ones. The "hook" used to move the hands is known as the setting lever (the watch is said to be "lever-set"). By the time that your father's watch, amongst the last of the railroad pocket watches, was built, The Ball Company (and its predecessors under various Ball names - the Ball name is used hereafter to refer to the Ball companies collectively) had a sixty year history of having watches built to its specifications by various manufacturers in the U.S. and Switzerland. The final adjusting of almost all Ball watches was done by Ball, not the original manufacturer. Ball started doing this in the early 1890's, but its not clear if they were still doing it after World War II. In addition to marketing watches, the Ball organization had a branch that performed time inspection services under contract to the railroads. In a 1910 interview, Ball claimed that his inspection services covered about half the railroads in the U.S. Documents have yet to come to light indicating that these services were performed in Canada as well, but there is one branch of Ball operations in Winnipeg; The Canadian Ball Watch Company, Ltd. Movements were shipped to Canadian Ball, who would then case them in-house. Its not clear if these were shipped directly from the original manufacturers, or if they were shipped through Ball in the U.S. Thus, its also not fully clear if watches were adjusted by Canadian Ball, or if they were adjusted by Ball in Chicago and then shipped to Winnipeg. There was a long-standing, industry-wide practice of just importing movements into Canada and assembling them into cases (either domestic or imported) once they arrived. This was done in order to pay a lesser import duty on "watch parts" than would be charged for "complete watches." As an example, one Canadian Pacific Time Service official (Peter Kushnir of Montreal, PQ) once described packages of U.S. movements, albeit not Ball movements, arriving with their U.S. cases in the same package, but not assembled together. Frequently, the movements would be cased in Canadian-built cases, such as Empress or Fortune. A 1953 T. Eaton catalog (which can be seen at: http://elginwatches.org/scans/non_elgin_ads/1953/m_index.html) that shows both Waltham and Hamilton watches, only available in the U.S. as complete watches including their U.S.-made cases, being sold in Canada in Canadian-made cases. A large proportion of movements are housed in gold-filled cases. These cases are made of a sheet of inexpensive, "composition" metal (brass), sandwiched between two thinner sheets of gold by applying heat and pressure. During the 1930's, one process of doing this gave rise to the term, "rolled gold-plate." The gold sheet that becomes the inside of the case is much thinner than the gold sheet that becomes the outside of the case. Frequently, the purity of the gold used in the sheets, expressed in karats, is stamped inside the back of the case. Some case companies indicated the thickness of the outer layer of gold by using different trademarks for different thicknesses. Before federal regulations outlawed the practice, some case companies indicated the thickness of the outer layer by the number of years for which the case was warranted. Not all case companies were forthright about marking the cases or honoring the warranty (which is what gave rise to the federal regulations). Frequently, the color of the gold (imparted by the metal with which the gold is alloyed) is expressed in conjunction with the term, "gold-filled." Thus it is not uncommon to see terms such as "yellow gold-filled," "white gold-filled," "green gold-filled," and so forth, used in case descriptions. The tiny numbers and marks on the inside of the back of the case are watchmaker's or jeweler's marks. When watches were serviced, the watchmaker would place his mark and a date code inside the back. The marking might include a code to indicate the type of service that was done. Thus, when the watch came back, the watchmaker would instantly know just when he (or she) last worked on it. I purchased a very similar, grade 435 series Ball Official RR Standard watch within the last year on eBay. The auction closed at $200 (US). Grade 435 series Ball watches are frequently available on eBay and, since most collectors in North America tend to ignore lesser-known Swiss watches (such as Record), their auction closing prices tend to be below those for similar U.S. built watches. Of course, as a family heirloom, its irreplaceable and is worth infinitely more to the family. Good luck with a nice momento of your father, Kent ----- Original Message ----- From: "Josh (Norm) Audette" To: Sent: Sunday, February 09, 2003 12:16 PM Subject: Railroad watch > > > > Hi. I have a railroad watch that my father used when he worked on > trains in Manitoba (Canada). I just discovered it yesterday, and I'm > looking for more information about it. > > The front says "Ball - Official RR Standard - Cleveland". The top > screws off and there's a little hook that, when pulled, allows you to > set the time using the winding stem. The little hook is at the 11 > o'clock position. > > The bottom also screws off, and the workings resemble this picture > exactly: > > http://www.pockethorology.org/Railroad/Fig_33.jpg > > Except mine has serial number 0907. On the back of the bottom cover, > it says "Fortune - 10K Gold Filled - Case made in Canada - STURDY > 5005338". Just under the "Fortune" there's an icon that looks like a > tree. There's also a hand-engraved serial number of some sort but it's > tiny and I can't read it without a magnifying glass. > > I'm trying to find out more about this watch, such as who made it, what > it might be worth, etc. Do you know anything about it? Maybe you have > some websites you can point me to? > > Any help would be appreciated. > > > Why, oh why, > Do my telnet sessions die? > - Norm, "Ode to a bad firewall" > - - -.-- .-.. - - -.-- .-.. - - -.-- .-.. - - -.-- .-.. - - -.-- .-.. > Josh "Norm" Audette AIM: normmonkey ICQ: 25260232 > Systems and Network Administrator (Contract) > Linuxcare. Simplifying Server Consolidation. > 10101001010100101100110011000100000101010010101001011001100110001000000000 > . .-. - .-- . .-. - .-- . .-. - .-- . .-. - .- . .-. - .-- . .-. - .- > >