CALIFORNIA DIALS, A PERSONAL DISCOVERY

I like checking out watches wherever they might be sold, a lifelong affectation that hopefully I get to continue for a very long time especially at a moment in my life when I can finally self indulge without worrying about Kumon lessons, adequate dollars to repair the flat roof over our hovel building, well balanced daily dinners and even occasional trips to over rated restaurants favoured by the Mrs who just craves some experience more than the daily grind of getting and spending to arrive at a next day of getting and spending. A wonderful thing happened on the way to my present station in life, I want to just hear the stories from people who wear a watch, nothing special but the anecdotes feed my soul, reaffirm my often misunderstood obsession with watches of every description. I was just looking at cases of timepieces in a mall shop where Longines, and a few other medium tier brands were the All Stars, lording over Gianni Vesace, Hugo Boss, and even Giorgio Armani. A tall poorly dressed clerk offered insincere assistance. Thx, I’m good, haha! He was wearing a 1960s watch, a large post WW2 steel timepiece with a pale red( not pink) California dial. He smiled, suggested that I had a personal connection to the notorious vintage watch seller who used to brag that dealing drugs in the gritty east end neighbourhood where his antique store prospered was stupid, he made more money dealing Frankenstein watches! His customers were not horology enthusiasts just fashion forward people who wanted a fun watch and a happy life. He would engineer inexpensive vintage watches to sell to young people, persons working fashion etcetera. The clerk knew the seller well!

Early Rolex and Panerai watches from perhaps the 1950s( I am not a watch historian, my info arrived from the streets and persons who shared their stories with me) often were fitted with dials that featured both Roman and Arabic numbers except at 3, 6, 9 with an inverted triangle at 12. Dials at one time famously featured dials where radium was painted onto the numerals on the dials. Dials fitted to timepieces with radium would be shipped to dial refinishers by sellers who wanted the best restorations possible, the best were in California so the stories go. Radium is dangerous to the wearer’s health. Some stylist must have created the now famous mix message dial or could have been some clever person who wanted to suggest a direct line from Roman(old) to Arabic( modern) nobody can state with absolute authority but my new friend insisted a California dial must display both Roman and Arabic, he was a very knowledgeable enthusiast who took a minimum wage gig to kill his idle hours. I did not want to challenge his and the most accepted explanation but my sis in law’s father worked for decades in COLOUR CORRECTIONS for products used in advertising as well as being a watch guy in his spare time. He said that when he started in the fascinating profession any package altered to show better in print and later television ads were called California something denoting something not original, made more desirable through thoughtful even playful alterations, to him a California dial was any altered or bogus item but not in any negative way. Something was hip, nice CALIFORNIA COOL where people tend to be less uptight about mundane issues.