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Abercrombie & Fitch 1958 Manual Chronograph

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Prominent figures who patronized the Abercrombie & Fitch Company in its excursion goods days include Amelia Earhart, Katherine Hepburn, Clark Gable, Teddy Roosevelt, John Steinbeck, and Ernest Hemingway. Their vintage catalogs are a mine of quality, useful items, from canoes, to tents, to shotguns, to fishing rods, and of course, watches.
This watch has exactly the same case as the early Seafarer and a very similar dial and is a great looking three-register, twelve-hour Compax Chronograph. A real beauty, the kind of watch that epitomizes vintage. Steel case with circular brushed domed screw-on back, high-domed crystal, and long-faceted lugs. This type of case was used by Heuer, LeCoultre, and Ulysses Nardin, for their register “sports” type watches – sport meaning pilots, sailors, and horsemen.
The movement is the venerable Valjoux 72 nickel-plated three register twelve-hour movement. Signed “Abercrombie & Fitch Co Switzerland serial 453306.” The case interior is signed “ED Heuer & Co, SWISS.”
This watch has been fitted with a Heuer Vintage Crown.
Now on to the wondrous dial: vertically silver scored with gold-plated rivets in the corners aged to perfection. Signed again “Abercrombie & Fitch,” with “Made in Switzerland” below the register at six p.m. The handset is gold-plated to match the rivets and the Arabic markers, which like the brand name are gilt applied with a black outline, as are the hour pyramid markers running around the outside. The watch came to me fitted with its original crocodile strap signed “Abercrombie & Fitch.” A very pretty watch from the late ’50s.

Alistar Gibbons Book – Chasing Time

John BUZZUFY

John BUZZUFY

Looking for information on watches, watch parts or watchmaker tools? BUZZUY blog provides valuable information on vintage and modern watches, chronographs, modern timepieces and collectibles. Follow BUZZUFY on Social Media as well for more information and updates. @buzzufy