Friday 21 December 2012

Bradley 1977 Star Wars Darth Vader watch

Back to the mechanical watches today. And as the Earth wasn't destroyed today as some view the Mayans predicted, it means that the latest attempt by the Empire to use the Death Star has been thwarted, and the subject of today's watch will be disappointed.

The watch is one of my Star Wars watch collection, but this time it is one of the originals. It was made by Bradley, and released in 1977.

1977 was the release date of the first of George Lucas's movies: Episode IV A New Hope. This was the movie that started the whole Star Wars juggernaut and brought the exploits of Luke, Leia, Han, R2-D2, and C-3P0 to the world's consciousness.

Bradley watch company was a division of Elgin National Industries. It was created in the mid 1970s and produced many collectable watches including Star Wars and Disney. The Bradley company was based in the USA (same as Elgin), but used Swiss mechanical movements and quartz modules in the 1980s.

The watch is a 3-hand dial with a Swiss mechanical movement. It has a number -023- on the back. It seems that two different sizes were made in some of the Bradley Star Wars watches, and if that is true of this model, this will be the junior size version (as it's quite small).

The face has a large picture of Darth Vader painted on with his light saber drawn, along with the Star Wars and Darth Vader names. At the very top of the dial, in extremely small writing, is the Bradley name. At the bottom is the copyright (1977 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp), and "Swiss made".

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