Tick-tock

About a year and a half ago, with my increasing immersion into steampunk, I decided that I should carry a better pocket watch than the steel Soviet commemorative one that I had gotten years ago when the Evil Empire was going out of business and selling stuff on the cheap. I pulled my grandfather's (on my mother's side) non-functioning pocket watch off the shelf and took it to a watch repair shop downtown in the hopes of having it repaired. It was a nice little gold watch and I thought it might be nice to carry around a little bit of history. I took it to Alvin's watch shop on Fifth Avenue downtown and the guy there said it would probably cost $45 and to come back next week.

I came back the next week and they said they wanted another week. I came back that next week and they said they would call me. I came back a few weeks later and they still hadn't done it. After two months of that incompetence I just took my watch back and took it somewhere else.

I took it to Henne Jewelers on Walnut Street in Shadyside and in short order they told me it wasn't worth repairing. Essentially, it was a fairly disposable watch one might get at K-Mart for $20, probably no more that 40 years old. I was a bit disappointed but appreciated that they could look at it and tell me about it whereas Alvin's had sat on it for two months and couldn't even tell me what was wrong with it.

I told my mom what I had found out about her father's watch and she said she thought they had some other pocket watches around. I went over to my parent's house some time later and my dad pulled the box-o-family-stuff out of the closet. It had a number of old coins. Costume jewelry. Some no-so-costume jewelry and a watch that my dad had gotten as a retirement gift, I think.

It was a gold (colored) Colebri pocket watch with a hunter case and a elk scene on the cover and a penknife fob. It was battery operated. I thought it looked pretty cheap, not much better than my grandfather's K-Mart special. I looked on-line and figured it would be worth under $100. Honestly, it was way to gaudy for me to carry but he gave it to me to keep.

Battery operated? Bah!

Then he pulled out a pocket watch he said was probably his grandmother's. He gave that one to me as well.

I was floored. Even more so when I looked up what it was. A Model 1873 14k gold case pocketwatch, manufactured by the American Watch Company with a woman's gold necklace and a cinch that looked like it had a pair of small pearls inlaid. I found a collectors website that had the original paperwork from the manufacturer, matched up the serial number and found it had been manufactured in May of 1881.

Over a century old, it didn't work.

So, I took this watch to Henne Jewlers and had them look at it. Their watchsmith said that the part that was broken would need to be hand made and it would cost $1200-1800.

From what I could find online, I was guessing that I would be spending more than it was worth to repair it and, with a remanufactured part, I wasn't going to be doing its overall value much good either so I put it aside.

In the meantime, Euphorbia got me a nice pocket watch for Christmas. A two-tone watch with the works showing from Gentleman's Emporium for all of $85. A reasonable price for something I'll be carrying around with me at cons and, being two-toned the silver matches the buttons on my vest better but, should I have another waistcoat with more gold or brass buttons, the watch will match those as well with the change of a chain. I have two chains, one gold and one nickel silver for just that sort of change up. I also picked up a replica War of 1861 ID tag as a fob to go with my steampunk persona. I really like that all the gearwork is visible.

But I kept thinking about my great-grandmother's watch.

A few weeks back, I took it to the Clark Building downtown, known for its high end jewelers, and found Kirk Dial of Pennsylvania on the 5th Floor. I left it with him for an estimate. When he didn't call me back a week later I figured I'd give him more time. When the Snowpocalypse hit I gave him even more time but called them back yesterday to check up.

They said that they had some trouble finding someone with an original hair spring but they would be able to repair it.

$250.

I am positively giddy. Not only am I going to get the watch repaired at a fraction of the cost and its value is going to dramatically increase but my great-grandmother's 130 year old watch is going to be working with all original parts.

And that is priceless.