Hi Keith:
Nice watch! 1901 is as good a date as you are likely get.
Information about Illinois watches may be found in
American Pocket Watches Vol. 2, Illinois Watch Co., Encyclopedia and Price Guide, William Meggers, Jr. & Roy Ehrhardt, Heart of America Press, Kansas City, MO, 1985 (no longer in print), and in
[colour=blue]Russell W Snyder's Illinois Data Base CD[/colour], which may be obtained by an email to Jon Hanson at
jonontime@aol.com Then, there are Oldwatch.com's
[colour=red]Illinois Production Date Chart[/colour] and the PocketWatchSite's
[colour=red]Illinois Date Table[/colour] which are an online means for determining the approximate production date of Illinois pocket watches. In general, we think of serial number vs. date lists - created by using the average number of watches produced over a period of years - to only be accurate within a year or two at best, and recognize that there are numerous exceptions wherein which the dates may be off as much as 3 years or more. This is not just for Illinois, but for other watch manufacturers as well.
Pictures and descriptions of some Illinois watches may be viewed online on
Pages 79 & 80 of the 1903 Oy Company Catalog at:
[colour=brown]www.elginwatches.com/scans/sales_catalogs/1903_Oy_Company/m_index.html[/colour]
Pages S1 – S8 of the 1917 Oskamp-Nolting Catalog at:
[colour=brown]www.elginwatches.com/scans/sales_catalogs/1917_Oskamp-Nolting/m_index.html[/colour]
[colour=blue]To view, go to the [/colour][colour=brown]Elgin Watch Collectors Site Home Page[/colour] [colour=blue]at[/colour] [colour=brown]elginwatches.org[/colour], [colour=blue]then copy and paste the address in your browser's address bar and click on [/colour]'Go'.
