Hallo,

said to be used on board of Italian Subs this large size dashboard Leonidas chrono, (AA size battery for comp) featured 3 inch dia, turning bezel and turning flange , bakelite case and equipped with the renamed Unitas 45C
rgds


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[IMG]
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y106/LIGE00/leonidassub006.jpg[/IMG]

Hi Enzo. Thanks for sharing the photos of your wonderful clock! I've not seen one exactly like it before.

Do you have any evidence that it was used on submarines? I don't see any Italian naval markings and the case is the same style as used on aircraft clocks with the cork shock absorber and three bolt mounting. A question that comes to mind is why would a submarine clock need a shock absorbing mounting?

Jim,

you surely right and in fact i have been conservative in my description but despite in some pubblications this watch is associated with Navy in some others it is with Airforce and i have never found any evidence of its usage....Where associated with Airforce unfortunately no aircraft model was given.
The watch itself has no any marking and probably it was stamped with paint somehow...
Hopefully someone may give some more info about its usage...
I am glad you liked it and for your information they appear time to time on Ebay...
rgds

Enzo

Hi Enzo, I like that clock. I don't think I have seen one before.

Period photographs sometimes show clocks in aircraft and on ships. Have you ever seen such images of WWI or WWII Italian militaria?

Hardly any information is available about Italian military timepieces. Whatever you might find is always welcome.

Best regards,

Greg

Hi again Enzo.

Please take a look at my thread on my Sonia Aircraft Clock here:
Regia Aeronautica clock thread

This is a Regia Aeronautica (Italian Air Force) clock in my collection. If you look at the case and even the winding stem you will see what I mean about the Leonidas looking like it was meant to be on an aircraft as opposed to a submarine.

Do you have any information you could share on this Sonia clock? I have seen some of these sell on Ebay over the past several years but their owners have not known any details about them. My guess is that it could be any time from 1923 when the Regia Aeronautica was first formed up until the early part of WW II. Thanks!

Jim,

i remember have seen your post at the time and felt surpriced to see your nice clock i ever seen before and did not know the exsistence of in my many years of spotting around....

The mvmt seems definetely a Unitas 19 lignes that could be better identified by the Bestfit.

Nothing more unfortunately I am aware of....

Greg , i will surely post some more Italian soon!

rgds

Thanks Enzo. You say the movement may be a Unitas 19 lignes. Does this mean that Sonia was not a watch making company and they only purchased movements to install in their cases?

Also, the winding stem on my Sonia and the one on your Leonidas are unusual and they appear to be exactly the same. Do you think it is possible that Sonia might have been a part of Leonidas? Does the Sonia company still exist in Rome?

Hallo Jim,

at this point it is worth on my side to further investigate about SONIA and then let you know....
The fact is that SONIA is a female name quite common in Italy...but this may not mean much.
The movements surely cannot be Italian and by confronting the setting parts on the Bestfit you surely can better identify it among the Unitas sizes....
Surely the similarities among the two clocks are evident but i do not think that Leonidas would sacrifice his well renamed logo to mark this other clock.
Surely the explanation lies somewhere else and i will do my best to find out....
rgds
enzo

Thanks Enzo. I hope you can discover something about the Sonia company and I look forward to hearing any information you find.

I have been looking at the photo of your Leonidas clock some more and I see additional ways in which it appears to have identical features to my Sonia clock. For example, the hour and minute hands seem to be the same. Also, the subdial for seconds seems to be identical as well. The shape of the numbers at 3, 6, 9, and 12 seem to be the same, and even the way the seconds subdial under the 12 cuts off the lower half of the 12 seems to be identical.

I would guess that Leonidas would have not permitted another company to use their designs in this way which is part of the reason why I suspect that Sonia may have been a part of Leonidas as an additional brand they sold, or maybe owned by Leonidas in some way.

I think I may have found an answer to my question as to the maker of my old Italian Air Force Sonia aircraft clock with the below "Rosetta stone" Italian Air Force Sonia clock which has a dial that is marked both Sonia and Leonidas together. The movement in this one is marked Leonidas as well. There are differences in the movement in my Sonia and in this Sonia-Leonidas though. In looking at this one, it would be my guess that Sonia was a sub-brand of Leonidas at this time - or the other way around but since Leonidas is fairly well known I would guess the obscure Sonia name is the sub-brand.

I found this one being offered this week on Ebay - it does not have its case unfortunately.

Hello Jim and all,

thanks for having posted this additional piece of Italian hystorical military horology very interesting indeed.

While I hoped you had found the Rosetta Stone i believe that we are on the track still somehow far....

Leonidas cannot be considered a movements manufacturer, it is not even listed among the Swiss makers but it was an assembler of different parts to come up with a finished product.

Léonidas Watch Co. was founded in 1841 St. Imier, Swiss by Julien Bourquin and despite they made some nice watches and clocks which the marked with their logo the movements were not of their own production and they did that with several.

Also No Sonia traces are found in the Swiss horological Archive to my actual knowledge.

The movement that they made these clocks with are Unitas ones to my opinion.

I attach a Unitas technical fiche from where it is distimguishable the unique Unitas style of the balance cock and general architecture despite Leonidas put their logo on.
These are more recent movements but Unitas kept their style.


We then still need to find out who this SONIA was and how comes that name appeared on a dial.

tnks rgds

enzo

Hi Enzo.

Thank you for your additional information!

Do you have any thoughts on the reason why this recently discovered Regia Aeronautica Leonidas/Sonia clock is marked with both names on the dial? I understand from your infomation that Leonidas did not make any movements - they only bought movements from Swiss makers and assembled them into watches and clocks that they sold to the Italian government. Perhaps the Leonidas company was selling clocks and watches to the Italian government using more than one name? I can not think of any reason why there would be both names on the dial of this clock unless there was a some kind of relationship between Leonidas and Sonia where one or the other was assembling this aircraft clocks for the R. Aeronautica under the Sonia brand name for some, and under a combined Leonidas-Sonia brand name for some others such as this recently discovered example.

As per Mrs. Pritchard, Sonia was a brand of Fritz Grandjean of Le Locle.This was listed as 1907.It probably did not have anything to do with your clock.
J Smith

Thanks Julian. It sounds like the Sonia brand name that was marketed by Fritz Grandjean could be just a coincidence of the same name used by two different makers at different points in time, unless there is some evidence that I have not seen that Grandjean also owned the Leonidas brand name. As Enzo mentioned, the name "Sonia" is a very common woman's name in Italy and given the "Made in Italy" text on the dial (of my clock with just the Sonia name further up in this thread)

I am wide open to any ideas on this mystery though.

Hello All

and thanks for the interest and the efforts that you are putting into this ''riddle''....

I suspect, i say suspect, that the answer lies in how the Italian Gvmt, in this case Regia Aeronautica (Ministry of Air ) used to purchase foreign manufactured items of their interest.

As it was discouraged to buy abroad products to encourage local productions (Autarchy was the leit motif at the time) and having no any precise watch manufacturing capacity they were forced to recurr to the Swiss industry.

But because it was hard to admit that they used a Italian ''middle man'' in between who was assigned the contract to supply the products and held responsible for warranties and repairs.

The ''middle man'' made things to appear the manufacturer of the item so the name brightly appeared on the dial and a little reference sometime was given to the manufacturer of the movements.

So we saw:

CAIRELLI,Zenith,
CAIRELLI, Leonidas, but it was a Valjoux 222,
HAUSMANN, Zenith,
BOSELLI, Zenith
OMT,
(also Panerai followed this rule)
etc.

Of these only Hausmann is still in business today.

SONIA, i suspect, was one of these but acted before and have left no traces.

All the people involved are long time gone but hopefully someone will find some evidence before or after and also i have not given up yet...


tnks rgds

That makes sense, Enzo. It is like the French during WW I when their Ministry of Air purchased aircraft clocks from a company called "Allion a Versailles" that did not actually make their movements but purchased them from a Swiss company.

Enzo, do you have any thoughts on the age of these clocks? Of course they would have to be sometime between 1923 and 1946 since those are the years when the Italian air force was named the Règia Aeronautica but I am hoping to narrow down the timeframe if possible. Their style seems to be from the 1920s or 1930s but I don't know.

Jim,

that is very true and French after the 2 war kept assembling the various Breguet, Airain, Dodane,Auricoste wrist and pocket watches and also aicraft clocks with Swiss movements namely Valjoux and Lemania but who could do locally any better and cheaply than Swiss' ?
I will contact someone at the local vintage aircraft reenactor group and date these clocks .
He himself owner of a Sonia unfortunalely was unable to find who Sonia was but i will keep seaching..

best regards

enzo

The Sonia type clock,or something similar, installed on dashboard of Ca100, 1928.
rgds



courtesy of GAFS,Ali Antiche. Italy

another typical installation of a Sonia type clocks....pic is 1941, the a/c should be a Caproni Ca164.

rgds

This is a Sonia i happened to restore some time ago.
Cheers, Aldo.

Cool clock. Now I want one even more.