Hello Dakota,
Thank you for sending in this pocket watch to mearto.com for an appraisal. I shall try to help you with that today.
TITLE:
Gent’s/Ladies, Art Nouveau, size 6, 20 year gold filled, pendant wound and pendant set, savonette hunting case pocket/pendant watch, Grade 117, made by the Elgin national Watch company, Elgin, Illinois, circa 1895.
DESCRIPTION:
Case – Size 6, four leaf, gold filled hunting case pocket watch with the outer covers having circular engine turnings engraved with foliage and a house on one side with a blank area on the other for the owner’s initials. The fluted gilt ball pendant is placed at the three position relative to the dial (savonette) and placed opposite the case hinge. The pendant is missing its round or oval bow (for the attachment of a chain or necklace). The inside of the cover is marked with the case number 633245, the makers name and model, Fahy’s Monarch model. (The Monarch is a gold filled case with two thin gold plates (2-4 microns thick) enclosing a base metal case. The gold finish on the Monarch model was guaranteed by Fahys to last at least 20 years. See History below.) There is a ‘j-420-s’ scratched into the inside of the cover, a private code put there by a watch repairman at some point in the past.
Dial – In your excitement to get the watch listed for appraisal you forgot to include a photo of the dial. However, I have done enough of this model watch to guess that it is a white enameled dial with Roman hours, closed bar minute track, subsidiary seconds dial @6, most likely steel Spade hands and the upper dial signed in the Olde English style, “Elgin”.
Movement – This is a size 6 gilt split three-quarter plate movement, the Grade 117, Model 2, Class 56, made by the Elgin National Watch Company, Elgin, Illinois with serial number 5722377 indicating the year of production to be 1895 and made in a run of 6000 such movements, each made with seven jewels, made for placement in hunting pocket watch cases with going barrel, quick train, plain index regulator, no adjustments for position but adjusted for temperature with a bimetallic balance wheel and the movement is not of railroad grade. The movement is properly signed and numbered.
CONDITION:
Case – The outer case and the inside of the covers are in very good condition. This design on the covers is typical of the Art Nouveau era of c. 1880-1910 which stressed the beauty of nature. The pendant is missing its bow.
Dial – Not seen but will assume it has no hairline fractures or chips and, at a minimum, in in very good condition. Chips or cracks would destroy the value of the watch.
Movement – In good to very good condition and considered functional.
FAHYS HISTORY:
Joseph Fahys came to America in 1848, took his training in Hoboken, N.J. and set up shop on Nassau Street in New York City in the year 1857. He opened a second case shop in Carlstadt, New Jersey in 1861. In 1882 he merged it with a large factory he had built in Sag Harbor, N.Y. Fahys generally made watch cases of either silver, gold filled or nickel cases. However, sometime between 1865 and 1890 he formed the Brooklyn Watch Case company for making solid gold watches. After 1900 he merged the Brooklyn Company with the two Fahys companies. By 1890, 500 workers were at work there turning out gold filled, silver and nickel cases. The "Fahys Watch Case Company" of Sag Harbor, N.Y. turned out to have filed ten trademarks with the government starting in 1891 and filing the last in 1905. Fahys main office remained at all time in New York City under the name of "Joseph Fahys & Company" of New York City and Brooklyn. They filed their first of six trademarks in 1908 and their last in the year 1925. The company operated until the great depression of 1929. By the mid-1930's Bulova had taken over their Sag Harbor factory.
ELGIN HISTORY:
Elgin History: The Elgin National Watch Company was founded in 1864 in Elgin, Illinois as the National Watch Company. In 1874 the name was changed to the Elgin National Watch Company. Between 1864 and sometime in the 1960s, Elgin manufactured tens of millions of pocket and wrist watches. The Elgin National Watch Company was for a time, one of the largest industrial concerns in the world. Elgin pocket watches from the early years are particularly interesting because of the methods and philosophy of the Elgin Company. Elgin used what were at the time quite advanced tools, techniques and labor practices to achieve a very high quality product, in high volumes, at a relatively affordable price. Elgin watches were created using mechanized, repeatable processes, organized quality control and standardized, interchangeable, parts. These things are all common practices in industry today, but not so at that time. The result was a product of high quality made in large quantities that dwarfed that of Elgin's competitors. Prior to Elgin's time, watches were made completely by hand, frequently by a single craftsman, from start to finish. Repairs could only be completed on such watches by someone with sufficient skill to fabricate replacement parts, from scratch, from raw material. Elgin watches on the other hand, were mass manufactured and highly standardized. Spare parts were provided by Elgin that were drop-in replacements for the originals. Elgin was extremely successful with this strategy. In fact, the company introduced more than half the watches made in America from 1920-1928. An Elgin advertisement in 1928 claimed that there were more than 14,418 retail jewelers in the United States and all but 12 carried Elgin
COMPARABLES:
https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/79836367_1888-elgin-11-jewel-hunting-case-pocket-watch (SOLD FOR $120 IN 2020)
https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/79118119_ladies-elgin-hunting-case-pocket-watch (SOLD FOR $60 IN 2019)
https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/34439238_elgin-pocket-watch-15-jewel-1886-size-6-gf-hunting (SOLD ON 2015 FOR $150 IN 2015 BUT THIS IS MORE HIGHLY JEWELED)
PRICING:
Once you are dealing with a gold filled, gold plated or rolled gold case rather than a solid gold case the value will stay low. This same watch in a solid 14k gold case would sell in the $350-$400 range. The fair market value of this example is in the range of $120-$140, with retail prices being twice that amount. It is a very beautiful watch just from an aesthetic viewpoint. If the dial is something other than I tried to describe or has any problems, send me a photos and I will properly adjust the price of this appraisal. I hope it was of some help to you in understanding this little pendant watch.
Thank you for using mearto.com. I enjoyed doing this for you.
My best,
David