FROM THE AUCTIONS. Record adjudication for the 8-days pocket watch “Howard, Davis & Dennison”

On June 2nd, the Jones and Horan Auction Team set a record with the highest-paid American pocket watch ever. This hasn’t to be surprisingly because the exemplar represents a piece of American history and watchmaking itself.
Built around 1852 by Warren Manufacturing Co., the Howard, Davis & Dennison pocket watch is one of the first watches produced according to the concept of serial manufacturing.

Image courtesy of Jones and Horan Auction Team

The story of this revolution began in the late 1840s when Aaron Lufkin Dennison approached Edward Howard and David P. Davis with the intention of creating a mass production of pendulum and pocket watches. Dennison’s foresight, however, went further as he wanted to create for the first time mechanisms whose components could be interchanged. Members of the Howard & Davis, a wall clock manufacturer, were interested in the project and together with Dennison founded a company in Roxbury, Massachusetts. Initially named Howard Davis & Dennison, then The American Horologe Co., in 1851 it was renamed Warren Manufacturing Co. in honor of Maj. Gen. Joseph Warren.

The first pocket watches produced were characterized by movements equipped with a double barrel and an 8-days power reserve. It seems that serials between 1 and 17 were reserved for the production of these models at 8 days of wind up while from the serial 18 onwards, for what should have been the mass production intended for the public, the caliber was simplified and the reserve reduced to 30 hours.
It’s not known for sure how many 8-days exemplars have actually been completed. It’s assumed that only the first three watches were completed and delivered to the founding members. The exemplary number #3 auctioned by Jones and Horan is one of them and is thought to have belonged to David P. Davis. The other two destined for Howard and Dennison are now at the Smithsonian Institute and the Waltham Museum (the latter was formerly part of the Ford Museum’s collection).
Of the 30-hour pocket watches, signed on the movement Warren Boston, are know existing five and the ones with the highest serial is the 44. For more details I suggest you to read what John Cote wrote on www.americanhorologe.com.