This article, and our identification tables and charts below, are the result of months of research and testing.
It’s a simple observation, but an important one. The Style Numbers consistently increased over time. While studying this data, a pattern emerged. One of the items to record is the pair of numbers stamped into the back of most Gruen watches, the Caliber and Style Number. It is from raw data such as this that patterns begun to emerge if you collect enough of it. This is the standard labor involved in collecting the basics.
In ongoing research into Gruen watch dating techniques, Gruen researchers log everything stamped onto the watch, inside of the case, and look for a match in vintage advertising. There is still is no single comprehensive source for dating Gruen watches, especially those produced after the mid 1930s.īy studying literally thousands of Gruen watches, and developing techniques for dating and identifying model names (and recording every detail about each watch) we believe we have reached a significant breakthrough that will help Gruen wristwatch collectors more definitively pinpoint the age of a given specimen. The past two or three years have yielded more tools for collectors to work with, but the results of all these efforts have proven painstaking and piecemeal at best, as information and clues are scattered among a variety of paper publications and online resources, the latter of which must surely put the number of sources into the dozens if you count discussion websites. All of which has resulted in a greater refinement of the original "Cleves Chart." (And that effort continues.) Beginning in the mid 1990s, with the advent of eBay and other online venues, collectors have been able to piece together additional dating information through the posting of individual vintage advertisements. Certainly, the movement dating chart developed by Gruen collector Charlie Cleves, of Bellevue, Ky., almost 30 years ago was a good start, and pointed many collectors in the general vicinity as far as dating a given specimen. Yes, there are bits of information scattered here and there. The chance to play the starring role in your own mini version of CSI (a popular crime show on the CBS Television Network in case you've been living in a cave for about the last decade or so) is irresistible to some. But, ironically for some, it is a great source of fun and fascination, as the process of dating a given specimen often involves piecing nuggets of information together from far-flung resources. The wonderful Gruen Guild Book that the company put out between 1929 and about 1931 (and widely available online) is arguably close to a "Masterbook" of Gruen watches, particularly wristwatches made up to that time period.īut from about the mid 1930s to 1958 (when Gruen ceased production of watches at their factory in Cincinnati), the number of movement calibers exploded, and the serializing of those movements took on byzantine characteristics that make Egyptian hieroglyphic look like a Kindergarten reading primer by comparison.įor most collectors, this is frustrating. Not so for Gruen, being the "orphan child" without a birth certificate because of a rather complicated method of serializing their movements, the records for which have been long lost, and most likely destroyed.Ĭuriously, the process for dating the earliest Gruen wristwatches - from about 1915 to 1935 or so - is probably the easiest because of the limited number of movements that Gruen had available, and the resulting relatively small number of specific models. These and other brands have volumes of material and definitive movement serial number listings that allow for precise dating down to the year, and in some instances even the MONTH, in which a given specimen was manufactured. There is precious little information "out there," unlike many other popular brands such Hamilton, Rolex, Omega, Elgin and others. If you've collected Gruen watches for any length of time, you know how difficult it is determine - at least with any degree of accuracy - just when a specific model of Gruen was made.
Breakthrough Research Smooths Rough Road for Gruen Wristwatch Collectors
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