Jeager LeCoultre needs very little introduction to the watch collecting community. Hailed as “the watchmakers, watchmaker”, Jaeger Lecoultre was founded in 1833, development over 1,200 mechanical calibers, over 400 patents, and made movements for companies like Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet, Vacheron Constantin, and IWC. Of course, they developed and sold watches in-house as well and made some of the worlds best.

A great example of the watches they made is this time-only, stainless steel piece from 1961. Beyond the look of the watch, there is plenty for one to explore and discover about this piece. The watch was manufactured in 1961, and is a 33mm, stainless steel cased piece. During this period, the watch buyer most sought precious metal pieces, so this piece was much more under the radar during that time. While the entire history of the piece is unknown, it is safe to say the case is in great condition. The edges of the case and lugs are sharp, pointing to very little signs of polish.

Going beyond the case, the dial is a creamy white tone in good condition with gold applied hour markers that match the gold hours, minutes, and center second hands. Watches of this era commonly have dials that have been cleaned and it is extremely rare to find one that was not. Looking under a loop, there are some specs of dust near the applied hour markers, so it is likely the watch dial has been cleaned. But, it does not appear to be refinished.

Talking about a watch without mentioning its’ movement would be the wrong approach, especially when the movement is fairly significant. In this watch is the caliber K 478/C manual wind movement. The movement was developed from the JLC caliber 470 - a manual wind movement that was originally used in the military Mark 7 A watches and is an exemplar movement for precision. The movement evolved into other caliber, the 478 being one of them. One of the movements, the caliber P 478 BWSBr, was a movement used in the JLC Geophysic in 1958 - a legendary watch amongst collectors.

Introduced in 1945, the caliber 478 was also identical to the caliber 479 which was used in JLC’s Mark X pilot watches that were delivered to the British RAF in 1945. The only difference was that the caliber 479 had a subsidiary seconds, instead of center seconds. Looking at the case, an even cooler feature was the case design looked very similar to the military watches produced with cousin calibers, explaining the case metal and its design features.

If one flips the watch over to look at its’ caseback, one will find a screw-down caseback with an inscription that reads “1961 D Tracey, Over 40 Years with C.S. Milne & Co Ltd.”. The inscription likely points to the sale and gifting of the watch in 1961 to D Tracey for 40 years of service with a company located in Deptford, South London, United Kingdom. A quick search for the company will explain that the company appeared to specialize in welding and cutting industrial materials. They also made gas-carbide bicycle lamps and tools, some of which have a large amount of interest from gas and oil lamp collectors.

Stepping back quickly, D Tracey worked for this company for over 40 years. That puts his first day of work for the company in 1921. This was just after World War I and had some interested current events. The USA and Germany signed the Treaty of Berlin for Peace after the war. The Communist Party of China was formed with Mao Tse-Tung as the founding member. The Irish Free State was created. Russia experienced The Great Famine. Coco Chanel introduced “Chanel No. 5”. All of this was just in the first year that D Tracey worked for C.S Milne & Co Ltd. Still another 40 years to go before he was gifted the watch we have today.

Provenance is an interesting term that has become more and more important to collectors. D Tracey may not be a Paul Newman, or a former president of a country, but the little piece of history this watch holds is quite the story.

Enjoy!