The (now not so mysterious) Kessel Watch has arrived!
A few weeks ago, I made a post asking about the origins of a melody alarm watch I found for sale on Etsy by a Ukrainian seller. I ended up buying the watch and have been wearing it the past few days.
As for where the watch came from, it was made in Hong Kong by a company called Kessel Electronics sometime in the early 1980s (when Hong Kong was still a British overseas territory). They haven’t made watches in a long time, which explains why there isn’t a lot of info about them.
Some of you may be wondering, how on earth did this end up in Ukraine in the first place? Western watches in the 1980s were routinely smuggled into the Soviet Union to be sold on the black market. This is probably one of them.
The watch itself has an alloy case (stainless steel case back). It feels lightweight and cheap, but definitely better that Casio’s with resin cases. It’s also not as tall as something like an F91W.
The bracelet is stainless steel. It’s a hair puller, but I was able to adjust it to fit my wrist perfectly.
As for functions, it has a 24 hour mode, day/date, chronograph, and alarm functions with melodys (very 1980s). It plays (beeps) up to seven songs, which I have listed below. It has no backlight, so bring a torch if you want to tell the time with one of these at night.
Yellow Rose of Texas
Dixe’s Land
Stars and Stripes Forever
American Patrol
Anchors Aweigh
When the Saints Go Marching In
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Not sure if it was ever used to time the Millennium Falcon when it made the Kessel run. It’s definitely been on many adventures throughout the decades, so I wouldn’t be surprised if it did :)
Watch collector since 2022
Back around 1980, I had a watch made by NSC that played "When the Saints Go Marching In". The nostalgia... Interesting watch.
With that name, the Star Wars theme song should be on the song list. Very interesting find!
Haha. I was just about to ask how many parsecs it took to be delivered.