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Dennison Omegas - a potted history
As you may or may not have guessed from my past threads, I have quite a ‘thing’ about Dennison-cased watches (Omegas in particular). They were one of several English companies specializing in casing other manufacturer’s watches. For most of their existence, Dennison’s produced cases for the ‘poor man’ – i.e. someone who couldn’t afford the expense of a solid 18kt gold watch but wanted the look. It was only in the 1950s that they started producing 18kt gold cases – and what fabulous quality they were.
Dennison’s started in England in the 1870s when Aaron Lufkin Dennison set up shop in the Handsworth area of Birmingham after a somewhat chequered career in the USA, mainly with Waltham. By the end of the century, the company had evolved into the Dennison Watch Case Company and was run by Aaron’s son. They were renowned for their solid gold, gold-capped and gold plated fob watch cases – here is one that belonged to my grandfather (dated 1913).
This particular fob watch is only gold plated (we’ve never had any money in our family!!) but there were three versions namely ‘Sun’, ‘Moon’ and ’Star and the plating was guaranteed not to wear through for 30, 20 and 10 years respectively. It was important for those in the early 20th century to appear respectable and a gold watch and chain implied affluence and status – it was difficult to tell from a distance that a watch was only plated – so a ready market for those on a budget who wanted to impress.
To understand the rationale behind casing other manufacturer’s watches you need to appreciate that for a lot of the previous century, there were import restrictions on high value items (e.g. watches and particularly gold ones) and not just in the UK. To get round this, some of the watch manufacturers exported ‘bare’ watch movements to the recipient country and allowed the authorized dealers to ‘case’ the movements in locally produced cases.
Omega produced watches in 18kt, 14kt, gold capped, gold filled, and gold plated (I do believe that they also produced a small number of 9kt gold watches but only for a quartz watch in 1985) - so, for a long time, there was a niche for a case manufacturer to produce a case in 9kt gold which would be better than a gold capped Omega but less expensive than the pucker high-carat solid gold ones. Dennison’s was one such company. The Dennison case designs tend to be very similar to the official Omega ones – this can be no accident and confirms that they were officially sanctioned by Omega. Dennison’s cases tend to ‘follow’ the Omega trends and were still produced sometimes long after Omega had moved on. This was probably down to the fact that until the 1960s, the UK market was quite conservative.
Virtually all the 9kt Omegas you find will be English cased (by Dennison’s, DS&S, Montal, BWC Stolkace and so on) as 9kt was peculiarly British and the minimum gold content allowed to be called ‘gold’ (correct me if I’m wrong but in the US the minimum was 10kt and in Europe it was 14kt). Dennison’s produced wristwatch cases for Omega, Rolex, Tudor, Smiths, Vertex, Garrard, Waltham, Tissot, Longines, Zenith, Rotary, J W Benson and others.
This is my 1935 Omega T17 - a hinged case in 9kt gold - together with my 1948 Omega 30T2 with a 9kt clip back case
They tried their hand at making complete watches using their cases and bought-in movements but this wasn’t successful (not such a daft idea as this was how Rolex started out after all).
During World War 2, they made lightweight steel and alloy cases for the Air Ministry and these usually housed Omega (30T2) or Ebel movements – known as 6B/159 watches and here is one (dated around 1943) – generally issued to RAF pilots and navigators and very similar to the 6B/159 Omega 2292 on the right.
Unfortunately none of the 6B/159s were very watertight and hence they suffered from corrosion - so in the 1950s the Ministry of Defence commissioned Dennison to manufacture a watertight steel case – the Aquatite’. Many of the old 6B/159 watch movements (Omega, JLC, IWC, and others) were re-housed in Aquatite cases in a typical penny-pinching ploy to upgrade rather than re-purchase – they were often re-dialled with tritium lume at the same time as the Ministry had discovered that stockpiling radium watches caused all sorts of problems. Dennison also produced a solid gold (9kt) version of the Aquatite for companies such as Rotary – I’ve seen only two and if you have one of these and don’t want it, let me know – but the Aquatite served as the prototype ‘screw-back’ case which they would later use for Constellations and Seamasters in the 1960s. By and large though, steel cases were a bit of a sideline for Dennison and were mainly produced for the Armed Forces – there was, after all, little demand for steel cased watches as the original manufacturers produced them cheaply and in vast quantities themselves.
A sign of increasing affluence was that by the end of the 1950s Dennison started increasing production of cases in 18kt gold (as well as 9kt). These were first produced in clip-back form (this was not a shortcoming as Omega were also producing clip back watches) and here is a photograph of a late 1950s Seamaster in 18kt gold with a 501 movement
But in the 1960s, Dennison were still producing the same design of 9kt watch case that they had been producing in 1940 – here is a photo of a 1941 Omega and a 1964 Longines – both in the same 9kt case (ref 13322).
In order to regain competitiveness, Dennison needed to step up a gear and they started producing 9kt and 18kt gold screw-back ‘waterproof’ watch cases – it seems that generally the 9kt ones were reserved for Omega Seamasters and the 18kt for Constellations – and they also produced a 9kt ‘front-loader’ case for an Omega Geneve look-a-like.
These were undoubtedly the crème de la crème of gold Dennisons – superbly made and much heavier than the Omega version. But one has to ask how these later Dennison cased Omegas competed against the genuine Omega version – yes I’m sure that the 9kt version would be cheaper than a 14kt Omega but there couldn’t be much between the cost of the 18kt versions. Maybe this was the reason for Dennison’s demise – increasing affluence meant less demand for the cheaper 9kt version as people wanted the ‘real thing’ and there wasn’t enough demand/profit in the 18kt version and little distinction between an Omega cased watch and a Dennison one.
Dennison went out of business in February 1967. The trouble is that there is so little information about them now. I have long puzzled over the case reference numbers and case serial numbers, trying to piece together some of the history. But recently I have been scouring the internet looking for Dennison cased watches and then noting down the case serial numbers, reference numbers, movement type and serial numbers etc. and I’ve been able to put together their system of numbering which other Dennison anoraks out there may find interesting – the rest of you will probably have fallen asleep.
All Dennison gold watchcases were assayed (hallmarked) in Birmingham – it is one of only a few assay offices in the UK and every hallmark can be dated. When you look at a genuine Dennison case back from an Omega watch, you will usually see the Omega triangle, which shows that the case was officially sanctioned by Omega (this is usually seen only on Omega watches from ~1953 onwards) plus a case reference number (eg. 13322), a row of hallmarks (showing the assay office, the grade of gold and the date letter) and the case serial number. Using the hallmark date letter as the dating reference (backed up by the movement serial number where possible) I have discovered that as far as the gold watches are concerned, a sequential case serial numbering system started in about 1930 (prior to that the system seems a bit haphazard and I can’t work it out - yet) regardless of whether the cases are 9kt or 18kt, men’s or ladies, Omega or other movements. In around 1959/60 the numbering system reached 999,999 (probably that was the stamping machine’s maximum number!) and the numbering system started again for the final 7 years of production. If any of you want this information in tabular form I can post it but I don’t want to bore you too much right now.
Dennison’s case reference numbers seem to follow a pattern of their own with no discernable trend – that is until Omega changed to a six-digit case reference number in the 1960s. Then the Dennison case reference numbers follow the Omega system with an extra digit in the middle (usually a five) e.g. Dennison case reference 1685004 is almost identical to Omega case reference 168.004.
These photos show a pre 1953 case back (no Omega triangle) and a post 1953 case back (showing the triangle). The case reference number is the top most number and the case serial number is at the bottom
Interestingly, in the case of clip-back watches, often the last 3 digits (or sometimes 4 on steel watches) of the case serial number are stamped on the rim of the case near one of the lugs - see below (283 stamped on rim near top left lug)
From this it is possible to ensure that the case back and case have always ‘been together’ and that it is not a frankenwatch.
So when you come across a gold Omega (or other make), take the rear cover off and have a poke about. If you see ALD or Dennison, you have an English cased watch. Check the case serial number and see it the last three digits are repeated on the rim of the case to confirm that the case and back are original. Then look at the movement serial number and compare the production date with the hallmark stamped on the case. It’s easy really and great fun.
Yes, I know – perhaps I should get out a bit more!!
Cheers
Andrew
PS This was never meant to be the definitive study of Dennison’s – if you can add further or correct me where I’m wrong then I’m quite happy – I’m always willing to learn.
Dennison Omegas - a potted history
That's a Desmond type article
Your labor of love...
Read from beginning to end . . .
You're way ahead of me Andrew........
an enjoyable read
A bit more...............
your hard work is greatly appreciated
very informative piece of work...
Thanks Aroma, a great article.
For the record
My Dennison Omega
If it's in good running condition, then yes, it's . . .
Emplacement crystal for Dennison cased Omega pocket watch
