It was 80 years ago (I know, I only had two days left to be able to start my thread with this sentence.....) Omega was celebrating the 40th anniversary of the name Omega. Today's official history of the brand starts in 1848, when the Louis Brandt Company was created. I suppose this change made things easier to produce a centennary watch before 1994. But the first Omega movement was created in 1894 and in 1934 Omega produced a model with a very specific dial and hands, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of this creation.
This model was advertised in newspapers :


Here is mine, caliber 38.5 inside :


And on a shop display (just in case you would wonder how much it was sold) :


In addition, Omega distributed to its retailers a commemorative medal. One of them just joined my collection a few days ago. I just wanted to share with you :

It is quite large (13X10.5cm) and I suppose it was exposed in the shops.

From what I could read, there were some celebration in Switzerland in1944, for the 50th anniversary, but for obvious reasons (the world was busy with other more important topics) nothing really occured abroad.

All my best wishes for the new year and I hope I was not too boring with my old stuff.

 

Hello Yann,
Happy New Year!
Boring? Definitely not!!
Reading your posts are like visiting a history museum! Am I in Bienne?
I always enjoy learning details of Speedmasters, Seamasters and Constellations but nothing is more enjoyable to me than your outstanding examples and wonderful knowledge of the earlier days of this brand.
What a joy and a treasure you and your examples are to us at this forum and to this hobby.
Salute!


195 Francs, any idea of the exchange rate back then?

 

Bore us all you like Yann

Your magnificent antiques are anything but uninteresting and the accessories/brochures/posters etc add great substance to your posts.

Do you have a movement shot of the watch?

Cheers

Jim

 

Hi, Here is one shot of the caliber, 38.56 L T1 :

 

Nice catch Yann. I have the movement in a similar case and dial configuration but with a different hands set.
Each time i wanted to get one with these nice skeleton leaf hands i was either too late or the watch had different inconveniences.

I believe it's French francs. Yann's watch is a French export. Possibly the display too.

The medal given to the widow of J. TAHOU is another reason to think so. If i'm not wrong, TAHOU was most likely an AD in Lourdes, Midi-Pyrénées.

/F

 

Hi,
I will look in my catalogs tomorrow but I think I remember that the same dial was used without those hands on another reference. Do you have a picture of your watch?

You're right it's 195 French Francs. The ad comes from a French newspaper and indicates also 195F. To confirm, here is a scan of a 1935 French price list with this reference (CK374) at the same price :


I didn't know Tahou AD, thanks for the information. However the watch, the display and the medal come from different origin although I believe they are all French, so it's not a way to identify their original country.