I recently aquired a Hamilton 974 in the 700,000 sn range with a 4 post dial. The dial however is not written in script as is usually the case with these dials. As you can see the dial is very nice, single sunk, and enamel. I am planning on sending this along (in exchange for $) to my brother, Charlie. Comments about the authenticity/desirability of this apparent replacement dial are welcome.

The back of the dial

Well the dial is authentic, and I would have to say it is a factory replacement dial that came out in the late teens thru the 30's. Most all the 4 post watches were produced from the start to around 1912. By 1913 the regular 3 post dials were being used and by 1914 I would say there were no more 4 post dial/watches at the factory. Somewhere around 1917 or later I believe the transition was started to the Block signature instead of the Script signature, and probably by 1921-22 all watches would now come from the factory with 3 post Block signature dials.

Its probably an original, factory replacement for the problem 4 post dials that were needing replaced by the late teens upward and this was offered as a replacement that would give the watch that "more modern" upgrade at the same time.

Another interesting thing is that the 4 post originals had the red 5 minute markers that you would have to read "upside down" from 20 25 30 35 and 40 minutes on both Roman and Arabic dials, but on the factory replacements that "issue" was corrected

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Heres a picture of the red 5 minute markers on an original dial that you can compare with Mike's dial;

regards,
bb

Thanks Buster, I thought as much by some reading I did on this site, but was not sure. I'd say they are unusual and quite possibly there is a place for them in a complete Hamilton collection. I actually like it as it is a cleaner looking dial.