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Names Related to Elgin Watches
This is a list of the names that are somehow related to Elgin
Watches. Most of these names appear on various grades of Elgin
watches.
| Name |
Abbrev |
Comments |
| Acme | ACM | See Sun-Dial |
| Advance | ADV | |
| Age | AGE | |
| Atlas | ATL | See Sun-Dial |
| America | AMR | See Sun-Dial |
| Thomas M. Avery | AVR |
2nd President of Elgin National Watch Company. |
| Gail Borden | GB |
Gail Borden opened one of his condensed milk plants in
Elgin in 1865. Yes, Gail is a he. Yes, this is the
company with "Elsie the cow" as a mascot. Gail Borden was
a stock holder in the watch factory, but never lived in
Elgin. His second wife once lived in Elgin and her
description of the green fox valley led Gail to choose it
as the site for his plant. |
| California Watch | CAL | |
| Chief | CHF | |
| Howard Z. Culver | HZC |
On 1884 board |
| Deluxe | DLX |
This name wasn't ever placed on the movements, just the
dials. This, of course, means correct identification of
this name isn't reliable due to dial switching, redialing,
and movement switching. |
| Dexter St | DEX |
There is indeed, a Dexter Street in Elgin. Simon
Newton Dexter was the brother-in-law of
B. W. Raymond. In 1838, after
Mr. Raymond had made many investments in Elgin, he
convinced Mr. Dexter to buy part of James Gifford's
original land claim for the city of Elgin. Later, when
the watch company was being founded, Mr. Raymond
maneuvered the town into buying Mr. Dexter's land at
a high price as their part in securing the watch company
in Elgin.
|
| Elite | ELT |
See Strand. Not as common as Strand, but has the same
damaskeening and found in the same run. |
| Father Time | FT |
The Father Time figure was used by the Elgin National
Watch Company from around 1871 when it appeared in an
Elgin Almanac through at least the 1930's. Elgin
management, and probably many other people, referred to
the people who worked at Elgin as "members of Father
Time's Family". Elgin placed the Father Time image on
many different items as well as using the Father Time
name for a line of railroad grade watches.
The traditional Father Time figure carried an hour glass
to represent the flow of time. In Elgin's version,
Father Time has dropped the hour glass and replaced it
with the Elgin watch.
The US Patent and Trademark off says that the first use of
Father Time was 12/31/1871.
|
| Charles (Chas) Fargo | FGO |
On 1884 board |
| J.V. Farwell | FAR |
According to article on the
Great Chicago Fire
John, along with his brother Charles B., started the "oldest dry
goods firm in Chicago"
|
| William H. Ferry | FRY |
Chicago investor?
In the NAWCC bulletin #148 vol 14/6 Oct 1970 on page
666, Henry Fried says that W.H. Ferry was a director of
the company from 1868 to 1874 and he died in 1880.
|
| Charles H. Hulburd | HUL |
3rd president of Elgin |
| Inter-Ocean | INT | |
| Lady Elgin | LDY |
This is the name that Elgin put on their very first
"lady's" watch, so the name seems obvious and natural.
However in 1860, eight years before the first Lady Elgin
was introduced, there was a very famous ship wreck of the
steam ship "The Lady Elgin". The pre-civil war tragedy,
which cost 300 lives, happened near Chicago where the
Elgin headquarters were located.. The passengers were mostly
members of a pro-Union militia, their families and
guests. There
were many political ramifications from this wreck, and
it resulted in a popular song, "Lost on the Lady Elgin".
Considering the fame, it seems unlikely that the folks
in the very pro-union city of Elgin weren't at
least aware of this, and it is possible that they may have
used this name on purpose.
A good write up on this can be found
here.
The US Patent and Trademark off says that the first use of
Lady Elgin was 12/11/1870.
|
| Lady Raymond | LDR | |
| Matthew (Mat) Laflin | LAF |
An original director and investor |
| Leader | LED | |
| George P. Lord | |
first business manager. |
| Lord Elgin | LE |
While Elgin did have a high muckity-muck with the last
name of "Lord" who worked for them, it is not clear that the
Lord Elgin line was named after him. G.P. Lord retired(?) in
1876, some thirty years before the first "Lord Elgin" watch
was created. It would have been hard for the folks at the
watch factory to
forget about the Lord family, as they were very active in
the Elgin community and donated a large park to the city.
However, it
seems equally likely that the "Lord Elgin" name was as a
play off the "Lord Elgin" that stole, er, uh, moved the
marble friezes/statues from the Greek Parthenon to England.
Also, at around this same time, Elgin seems to have
switched to "made up" names like "Veritas", "Father
Time" and "Overland". On the other hand, they also
resurrected the "Frances Rubie" name and created the
"Lady Raymond" name in this same general timeframe.
The US Patent and Trademark off says that the first use of
Lord Elgin was 11/15/1904.
|
| Lord Elgin Series | LES |
Watches in the "Lord Elgin Series" weren't actually
marked on the movement, nor the dial. The name was just a
marketing term. |
| M. D. Ogden | OGD |
Chicago investor? |
| N W Co | NWC | |
| Overland | OVR | |
| Benjamin Wright Raymond | BWR |
1st president of Elgin
The B.W. Raymond name was used from the very start right
up to the end for Elgin's Railroad grade watches. It is
frequently said that "all BWRs were railroad grade at
the time they were made", however I think there were a
few exceptions to this. In particular, the 12s BWRs
probably were never accepted in railroad use and
possibly some of the later hunter case movements never
were either.
The US Patent and Trademark off says that the first use of
B.W.Raymond was
01/01/1866, which is strangely enough, is
exactly one year before the first watch was produced.
|
| Frances Rubie | FR | |
| Joseph T. Ryerson | RYR |
An original director |
| Senior 17 | S17 | |
| Solar | SOL | See Sun-Dial |
| Standard | STD | |
| Strand | STR |
It isn't clear if this is really an "official" Elgin
name, or if it is some sort of Jeweler's custom name. However,
they do show up more often than other jeweler's names,
they are more highly adjusted than is normal for the grade
and the usually have different/nicer damaskeening. |
| Sun Dial | SUN |
From around 1897 to 1899, Elgin made three grades of watches
that they didn't sell under their own name, or so it appears.
One was the G=177, a 6s hunter case watch, one was the G=178, an
18s hunter case watch, and the last was the G=179, an 18s open
face watch. They were all very low quality (7
jewels, unadjusted watches) and it appears that most
of them had "fake" compensated balances. That is, the
balance wheel was made to look like a bi-metallic temperature
compensating balance, but it wasn't, but they were solid brass.
What Elgin lacked in quality in these watches, they made
up for in quantity. Almost a half million of these
watches were produced. Considering the quality, it is
understandable why Elgin didn't sell these under their
own name. While these watches are by far the worst watches that Elgin produced, they were still better than the "dollar watches" that started to sell in great numbers around this time and there were better than the low end Swiss watches, which usually had cylinder escapements.
These watches were sold under the "Sun-Dial", "Atlas",
"Acme", "America" and "Solar" names. Usually these were
marked as such on both the movement and the dial.
Sometimes the movement did mention "Elgin", but not
"Elgin National Watch Co.".
I get the impression that Solar Watch Co and the Atlas
Watch Co were trying to be "real" watch companies, even
though they resold other peoples movements, much like
the Ball Watch company was a "real" watch company. It
appears that Solar sold watches made by both Elgin and
New York Standard, while Atlas sold watches made by
Elgin and United States Watch Co. Sun-Dial and Acme may
have just been names that Elgin used so they could dump
cheap junk onto the market.
|
| Henry H. Taylor | TAY |
An original director |
| Transit | TRN |
It isn't clear if this is really an "official" Elgin
name, or if it is some sort of Jeweler's custom name.
They are fairly rare, they are more highly adjusted than
is normal for the grade and they have two-tone
damaskeening.
|
| Veritas | VER | Veritas means "truth"
in Latin. |
| George M. Wheeler | GMW |
An original director |
| 149 | 149 | |
| 150 | 150 | |
| 181 | 181 | |
| 270 | 270 | |
| 274 | 274 | |
| 280 | 280 | |
| 333 | 333 |
This "name" was marked on
several different grades of Ball-Elgin watches. (I'm not
sure if it was marked on all of the grades though.) |
| 348 | 348 | |
| 349 | 349 | Strangely enough,
this number is marked on more than just grade 349
movements. While grade 349 is a full plate model, this
name has also been seen on the 3/4 plate grades of 239 and
390. |
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