Waltham 220 (#18237826)

Horology, Personal Collection, Pocket Watches, Waltham

Serial #18237826. 15 jewels. Made in 1912. I *think* it has a gold mainwheel.

Nabbed it off eBay for $17, and the description said it was broken.

In truth, it seems to have fallen victim to having its case scrapped for gold value, and the roller had simply jumped the pallet fork (a 5 minute fix).

It was in perfect shape otherwise. I mean besides a smidge of corrosion on one of the jewel settings, it’s almost brand new. Not bad for a 101 year old watch. 🙂

(I need to get some better pictures to really show it off.)

Peace,
-Steve

Harry DeAngelis – My Great-Grandfather

Family, Family History

Harry (Aristodemo) DeAngelis

 

This is a restored photograph of Harry DeAngelis, my Great Grandfather (my mother’s mother’s father) that I restored from a sadly dilapidated state. Here’s what it looked like beforehand:

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Born on one of the seven hills of Rome, he slipped through Ellis Island illegally to get into the United States and somehow found his brothers who were here, miles from Grand Central Station looking for him. He couldn’t speak a word of English, but he quickly learned. Becoming a citizen as quickly as he could (it was much easier back then) he dropped his given name, Aristodemo, and took on the name Harry (after the song “I’m Just Wild About Harry”) as Italians were looked down upon, and he wanted to fully integrate.

The DeAngelis brothers originally had a bicycle shop where they sold and repaired bikes of all sorts, but as automobiles became more popular people came to them asking if they did auto repairs as well. At the time, there wasn’t as much difference between the mechanics of a bike and a car, so they started repairing cars. This eventually lead to them founding a car dealership (Nash, and eventually Cadillac, and Buick).

He truly attained the American Dream, starting off penniless and founding a strong legacy with a focus on education, frugality, and perseverance.

Anyways, I’ll have a full and proper biography about him up eventually.

Peace,
-Steve

Non-ID’d Old Family Photos

Hamilton 916 #3129232 – Julius Martin’s Watch

Hamilton, Horology, Personal Collection, Pocket Watches

Serial #3129232. 17 jewels. Adjusted to 3 positions. Made in 1923.

This watch belonged to my ancestor, Julius Christian Martin.

It’s now my personal timepiece on a fob I made out of some old cuckoo clock chain and a fine silver drop that used to be on a necklace I made for my wife that she wore for several years. It’s not particularly rare or worth much, but it has a lot of sentimental value (and is often more reliable than my iPhone).

More on this later. 🙂

Peace,
-Steve

Found a “Godless Dollar” and a Counterfeit

Errors, Numismatics, ,

So you may remember a while back about the story of the so-called “Godless Dollars” where some of the early Presidential dollar coins missed the machine that added the edge-lettering, which in turn left them devoid of “In God We Trust.” The media fiasco was enough that the Mint moved “In God We Trust” to the face of Presidential Dollars from that point on to avoid such accidents in the future.

Well, I just found one searching through some $1 coin rolls, and it’s genuine. It’s not a so-called “Buffy” dollar (i.e. a fake “Godless Dollar” where some enterprising idiot took a dremmel to the edge of the coin to buff off the edge lettering) as it’s weight is completely to spec and the edge is rough in the manner it should be.

From the same box of coins I also pulled my first contemporary counterfeit that I’ve found in the wild: A 2000-D Sacagawea dollar. The strike is horrid in odd spots, it’s not worn properly, and it’s almost a half-gram underweight. My guess is that it’s one of the infamous South American counterfeits (from either Ecuador or Colombia) as there were more enterprising individuals who produced several large stashes of fakes due to the fact that dollar coins circulate widely there.

Peace,
-Steve