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Lot Essay
With Patek Philippe Extract from the Archives confirming production of the present watch with silvered dial and raised gold hour markers in 1936 and its subsequent sale on 22 October 1936.
This watch is thought to be one of only two examples of a yellow gold reference 96 with such a sector dial and retailed by Tiffany & Co. to appear in public to date. A particularly attractive example of reference 96, it combines highly desirable features such as the two-tone silvered dial with the superb 1930 design and the celebrated calibre 12'''SC with indirect centre seconds. This ébauche was the result of Louis Cottier's and Patek Philippe's collaboration, where the centre seconds mechanism was ingeniously added to the existing 12'''120 "subsidiary seconds" movement.
Never out of fashion, the finest examples of reference 96 reveal to the best extent how architectural and timeless design remains modern even three quarter of a century after its creation.
According to the engraved inscriptions on the present watch, it was given by James Westbrook Pegler to Robert E. Stripling.
James Westbrook Pegler was born in Minneapolis in 1894. Originally a sports journalist, he became a newspaper columnist with the Chicago Daily News and The Washington Post. Pegler published three collections of his articles: "The Dissenting Opinions of Mister Westbrook Pegler", "T Ain't Right" and "George Spelvin, American and Fireside Chats". In 1940 he won the Pulitzer Prize for journalism for a series of articles exposing trade union racketeering. He died in 1969.
Robert Stripling was the long-time chief investigator for the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC). In 1949 he published "The Red Plot Against America", a substantive primer on the precise nature of the Communist threat against the United States of America - specifically the threat from within the United States of America.
This watch is thought to be one of only two examples of a yellow gold reference 96 with such a sector dial and retailed by Tiffany & Co. to appear in public to date. A particularly attractive example of reference 96, it combines highly desirable features such as the two-tone silvered dial with the superb 1930 design and the celebrated calibre 12'''SC with indirect centre seconds. This ébauche was the result of Louis Cottier's and Patek Philippe's collaboration, where the centre seconds mechanism was ingeniously added to the existing 12'''120 "subsidiary seconds" movement.
Never out of fashion, the finest examples of reference 96 reveal to the best extent how architectural and timeless design remains modern even three quarter of a century after its creation.
According to the engraved inscriptions on the present watch, it was given by James Westbrook Pegler to Robert E. Stripling.
James Westbrook Pegler was born in Minneapolis in 1894. Originally a sports journalist, he became a newspaper columnist with the Chicago Daily News and The Washington Post. Pegler published three collections of his articles: "The Dissenting Opinions of Mister Westbrook Pegler", "T Ain't Right" and "George Spelvin, American and Fireside Chats". In 1940 he won the Pulitzer Prize for journalism for a series of articles exposing trade union racketeering. He died in 1969.
Robert Stripling was the long-time chief investigator for the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC). In 1949 he published "The Red Plot Against America", a substantive primer on the precise nature of the Communist threat against the United States of America - specifically the threat from within the United States of America.