Help Identifying Grandmother’s Watch

[fwong208]

Hi TRF Family!!!

I need your collective WIS brains on this. Giving this a try!

My wife’s late grandmother passed this down to her a long while ago and it sat in a box for years. No box, no papers, no trail.

While organizing the home we came upon it again and my wife asked me to look it up and get some info on the watch just to try to understand it’s history.

Unfortunately, grandma is no longer around and her mom is clueless about it.

From what I can tell:

Fortunoff
Diamonds
Mechanical movement
14k case, 14k clasp/bracelet

Attached are links to the photos full size for clarity:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QLU...usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/13K-...usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Bat...usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kLI...usp=drive_link

Would love to know anything about this (year, model number, etc.). Much appreciated.

[fwong208]

Shot Fortunoff an email, seeing if they'd be in the slightest interested in helping dig. As I continue to dig, I'll upload more info here for those who are curious.

[WatchTimes]

Try posting photos not links.

[fwong208]

Hey Jeremy!! Hope all is well.

Yea I’ll adjust it to photos, realize it’s probably causing a lot of friction for people to view.

[fwong208]

As it won't let me edit here are the photos:

[MILGAUSS88]

Looks to be made in the fifties or sixties.
Fortunoff would be the jewelry store not the maker. Probably a Swiss made watch that they ordered with their name on it.

[fwong208]

Originally Posted by MILGAUSS88

Looks to be made in the fifties or sixties.
Fortunoff would be the jewelry store not the maker. Probably a Swiss made watch that they ordered with their name on it.

Thanks for the clues. Im tempted to try to open it and see if there's anything inside.

Im guessing its a simply pry to open.

[MILGAUSS88]

Originally Posted by fwong208

Im guessing its a simply pry to open.

Correct.

[fwong208]

Here is the Movement:

[fwong208]

As far as I can tell:

Case was made from Ross, a NY based watch case company, casing for brands such as Rolex?, Omega, Elgin, Longine: https://www.europastar.com/the-watch...the-1960s.html

Movement was harder to nail down. I'm finding similar looking ones from Elgin 833 Cal. The one in the watch though is stamped Sohorec S.A. but im finding next to nothing about that company, save a random ebay post: https://www.ebay.com/itm/126310038456

My take on it is probably nothing special about this particular piece unless someone here knows otherwise.

[MILGAUSS88]

S.A. would indicate that it is Swiss. Not an Elgin.
Woops just saw the Swiss at the top of the movement as well.
Hard to get over gold value for these smaller ladies watches.
Minimum it has to be an Omega quality. And even then it is minimal value.

[fwong208]

The only thing that's got me interested right now is: who was Sohorec SA and why is there nothing about them anywhere! Seems like a real nerdy rabbit hole to go down into.

You're right, it's Swiss, and there were some other similar looking movements online but not exact. Wondering if Sohorec SA essentially just used a movement that was out there, and branded it themselves on there or if there is actually some hidden, esoteric strong provenance or history behind Sohorec SA.

The watch is going to go into our set of mementos to get passed down through the family. The value here is in the memories.