vintage Hamiltons and Hamilton sellers, any suggestions?

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Hello, OF! I'm on the hunt for a vintage Hamilton for two milestones I'll be celebrating next year (the big 4-0, and getting married)

I'm eyeing a solid gold watch from the 40s or 50s with a 770, 982 or 982M movement. I've been looking at Wesley's, Wilshire's and Barton's and diving into great resources on HamiltonChronicles, VintageHamilton and HamiltonFieldGuide. I'm curious if you have any suggestions on sites or books to dig in further and trusted dealers. I'm hesitant to look at asymmetrical cases, even though they're quite cool, because I assume replacement crystals are hard to come by, though perhaps I'm off base if I'm just patient and find a crystal in good condition.

I'm in NYC and saw dealer listing a good looking Wesley-B for $3,500...which seemed beyond ambitious even with gold prices where they've been. Curious to know what I'm missing and if there are any models you like or interested in that I should be considering. Cheers!
 
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I have a Donald, made in 1947 with the gorgeous and excellent 982M powering it. This is an excellent watch just all the way around. It's 14k.


I also have a Piping Rock, made in 1929 with the 979F powering it. If I had only one dress watch this would be it. It's classy, it's thin enough to fit under any cuff, it looks great with a tuxedo. It's 14k.

I'll get a movement photo and add that later.
Edit: added photo of the 979F powering the Piping Rock.
Edited:
 
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It seems you already have found all the resources you need, especially the HamiltonChronicles are just immensely helpful when diving into vintage watches of that brand. Add the Gilbert to your list ;-)

Ebay and patience seems to be the way to go. You can still find a lot - really a lot - of replacement parts, movements, and yes, also crystals there as well (I use tiptopcrystals.com to verify the model number of the crystal I'm looking for, and there are still a lot of them floating around, even for the asymmetric watches). Sellers like "flashdealsallday" on eBay sometimes have movements that come with an original dial in good condition, in case you find a watch you like but the dial is not looking so good.

Prices for the solid gold models are through the roof, it seems. $3500 for a Wesley-B is ... quite a sum for about 14g of 14k gold. It IS a gorgeous watch, of course. But even sellers without such delusions of grandeur seem to be sitting over $1k these days.

Finally, to make matters worse (you're welcome!), I'd like to propose a Hamilton "his and hers" watch combo - don't know if your future wife would be into it, but it's a thought. And might make a difficult search even worse. There were several paired models in the 1950s, but the ones I like best are the Robert & Roberta - you can find the writeup on them here:
https://www.hamiltonchronicles.com/2015/12/1953-robert.html

Good hunting!