I picked up a 18s Elgin grade 149 20 jewel and a grade 246 Lace Doiley.

More case shots

149 movement

246 movement

149 old style script dial

The Doily is a dilly.

These and the Hampden have particularly nice cases.

The 246 is a 25 year case and the 149 is a coin silver case, which was quite cheap because it looked all dirty and the look of crud. You would think that some people would take 15mins to clean them and make about 2x as much. The Hampden was a $165 watch, beautiful non brassed case, one small ding if you look hard, nice dial and nice movement.

Claude,

Both watches are great examples of the beautiful movement decorating done at the Elgin factory. There were many other fancy top shelf movements being made during this time, but the high grade Elgin is a very special thing to look upon!

William

Well done Claude, those are beauties!

LOVE that 149, Claude! By the way, where in the heck have you been hiding?

Regard! Mark

I was over in the Netherlands for 2 months the last part of 2016 and this year I have been trying to catch up for being over there for 2 months. I have picked up a few watches lately but the prices seem to be all over the place.

And yes the 149 is a beaut, it looks good in the coin silver case and that case has nice tight unsprung hinges. You don't see that dial that often so I now have a 20j 150 with that dial and a 20j 149.

On the 246 I did recase it, it was in a beat up old silveroid case and they did not take the back off so in the ebay auction it had a picture of the case back and the dial and everybody passed it by. I saw moon hands and a double sunk dial and figured I would roll the dice and wing it. The 246 is the least common of the doileys, I need to put a crystal on it but other than that it is good.