Kent
12-25-2001, 11:05 AM
Hi Ewa, Merry Christmas:
So, you've got a Dueber Hampden VIKING ... pocket watch with a ... filled goldish circle on its face with silvery leafshapes... that ... says viking, 17 jewels adjusted 3806968 inside ...and in the lid it says 10k dueber gold filled.
Lets start with a brief history of the Dueber Hampden Co. which is told in "From Springfield To Moscow: The Complete Dueber-Hampen Story" by James W. Gibbs. It was origially published in 1954 and was enlarged as a supplement to the Bulletin of the National Assoc. of Watch and Clock Collectors in 1986. Briefly, John C. Dueber established a watch case company in Newport, KY in the late 1870's. In the mid-to-late 1880's he purchased a controlling interest in the Hampden Watch Co. of Springfield, MA. In 1888-1890, both operations were moved to a dual, attached set of factory buildings in Canton, OH. The company continued in business, producing both watches and cases until falling sales in the mid-1920's led to receivership in 1927. The manufacturing equipment, parts on hand and work in progress were sold to Russia. Operations ceased in 1930 when the machinery was shipped to Russia. It is believed that all factory records either went with the equipment, or were destroyed, and there are no surviving records from which to match serial numbers of watches against models and grades. Nevertheless, Messrs. J. Hernick and R. Arnold, by collecting descriptions of Dueber-Hampden watches, with serial numbers, over a decade or more, were able to partially reconstruct the serial number list. This was published in 1997 as NAWCC Special Order Supplement #1, "The Hampden Watch Co."
Only a small percentage of American watches were cased at the factories prior to the mid-1920's. Most watch companies just made movements in industry standard sizes. The case companies made cases in those same sizes. The practice at that time was to go to a jeweler, select the quality of the movement and then pick out the desired style and quality of case. The jeweler would then fit the movement to the case in a matter of moments. So, a Hampden movement would not necessarily end up in a Dueber case, although your watch myay have been sold complete from the factory.
In discussing watches, the movement is most important, with the case being considered a secondary item. Because of the need to be able to identify the movement accurately so that correct replacement parts could be obtained, the movement companies put unique serial numbers on their products. From the serial number, the grade, model and other information, such as the approximate date of manufacture, can be determined. For Dueber-Hampden, this information was re-constructed by Messrs. J. Hernick and R. Arnold.
Serial number 3,806,968 (if it was on the movement) was built around 1924. According to Messrs. J. Hernick and R. Arnold's book, it is a medium quality, 12-size, open-face watch, most likely with a case suitable for dress occasions. Its sounds like it has a nice metal dial with black enameled numbers on it, or perhaps contrasting metal numbers.
A large proportion of movements are housed in gold-filled cases. These cases are made of a sheet of inexpensive, "composition" metal, 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 erm, "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.
Kent
So, you've got a Dueber Hampden VIKING ... pocket watch with a ... filled goldish circle on its face with silvery leafshapes... that ... says viking, 17 jewels adjusted 3806968 inside ...and in the lid it says 10k dueber gold filled.
Lets start with a brief history of the Dueber Hampden Co. which is told in "From Springfield To Moscow: The Complete Dueber-Hampen Story" by James W. Gibbs. It was origially published in 1954 and was enlarged as a supplement to the Bulletin of the National Assoc. of Watch and Clock Collectors in 1986. Briefly, John C. Dueber established a watch case company in Newport, KY in the late 1870's. In the mid-to-late 1880's he purchased a controlling interest in the Hampden Watch Co. of Springfield, MA. In 1888-1890, both operations were moved to a dual, attached set of factory buildings in Canton, OH. The company continued in business, producing both watches and cases until falling sales in the mid-1920's led to receivership in 1927. The manufacturing equipment, parts on hand and work in progress were sold to Russia. Operations ceased in 1930 when the machinery was shipped to Russia. It is believed that all factory records either went with the equipment, or were destroyed, and there are no surviving records from which to match serial numbers of watches against models and grades. Nevertheless, Messrs. J. Hernick and R. Arnold, by collecting descriptions of Dueber-Hampden watches, with serial numbers, over a decade or more, were able to partially reconstruct the serial number list. This was published in 1997 as NAWCC Special Order Supplement #1, "The Hampden Watch Co."
Only a small percentage of American watches were cased at the factories prior to the mid-1920's. Most watch companies just made movements in industry standard sizes. The case companies made cases in those same sizes. The practice at that time was to go to a jeweler, select the quality of the movement and then pick out the desired style and quality of case. The jeweler would then fit the movement to the case in a matter of moments. So, a Hampden movement would not necessarily end up in a Dueber case, although your watch myay have been sold complete from the factory.
In discussing watches, the movement is most important, with the case being considered a secondary item. Because of the need to be able to identify the movement accurately so that correct replacement parts could be obtained, the movement companies put unique serial numbers on their products. From the serial number, the grade, model and other information, such as the approximate date of manufacture, can be determined. For Dueber-Hampden, this information was re-constructed by Messrs. J. Hernick and R. Arnold.
Serial number 3,806,968 (if it was on the movement) was built around 1924. According to Messrs. J. Hernick and R. Arnold's book, it is a medium quality, 12-size, open-face watch, most likely with a case suitable for dress occasions. Its sounds like it has a nice metal dial with black enameled numbers on it, or perhaps contrasting metal numbers.
A large proportion of movements are housed in gold-filled cases. These cases are made of a sheet of inexpensive, "composition" metal, 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 erm, "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.
Kent