Zell Brothers Turtle "Jubilee" CHRONOMETER

X350 XJR · Oct 17, 2022

"Turtle" was a registered trademark of Zell Brothers Inc, Portland OR, a high end jewelry store chain, 1912 to ca 2009.

Zell Brothers were an early distributor for Rolex in the US.

This sweet little stainless steel piece has an ETA 2370, in a very Omega like cooper finish with lovely damaskeening and peralge work.

UncleBuck · Oct 17, 2022

I see the 2370 under the balance but what does the ZXB/ZX8 tell us? US?

Nice piece, Norman.

X350 XJR · Oct 17, 2022

UncleBuck
I see the 2370 under the balance but what does the ZXB/ZX8 tell us? US?

Nice piece, Norman.

Thank you, so many cool oddities out there.

Just as Norman Morris imported Omega movements are marked OXG, ZXB was Zell Brothers import code for the movements they imported and cased locally.

Caliber561 · Oct 17, 2022

I find it really interesting that a lot of watchmakers around this time copied Omega's 'Deluxe Finishing' in order to connote precision and accuracy. The "Very Fine Adjusted," or VFA, movements from Grand Seiko do this too.

allwoundup · Oct 17, 2022

Another Zell Brothers, this one a “Turtle De Luxe” powered by a Movado cal. 470, Borgel case…likely late 1930s.