Collecting
By Steve Lundin
MY INTRODUCTION TO ROLEX WATCHES came from the unparalleled
fictional king of coolness, James Bond himself. By the time I viewed
“Dr. No” (on VHS tape), every aspect of the film had been analyzed
by the fanboy empire, including, of course, the Rolex Sub Mariner,
reference 6358, worn by the movie’s star, Sean Connery.
Unlike chunky mil-porn watches that have come to dominate the
adventure watch market these days; Connery’s Submariner com-
bined toughness with just enough elegance to warrant an invitation
from the battlefield to the cocktail party. Only two things held me
back from immediately going out and buying one: as a teenager I
simply didn’t have the cash, and even if I had, I was too cheap to
pay retail.
Like most cheapskates on a quest, I gathered as much free infor-
mation as I could. In the pre-Internet days that meant reading books,
poring over magazines, and studying ads. My inquiries began with
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the Submariner and soon grew to embrace the Sea Dweller, then the
GMT-Master models, the Explorers, the Milguass, Daytona and Air
Kings. The more I dug, the more I realized I didn’t know.
The model variants were staggering, with time itself adding to
the collection, through unintentional variants like the “tropical”
dials: those that have cracked and faded through exposure to the
sun. For anyone on a budget, a hobby of the imagination provides
the biggest bang for the buck! I worked multiple jobs while attend-
ing the University of Wisconsin, scrimping and saving, and visiting
pawnshops between Chicago and New York, on the hunt for a
Rolex at a price I could justify. Prowling Manhattan one summer
afternoon, I came cross an older Air King in the window of New
Liberty Loans. It was a stainless model, early 60s, on a leather
strap. Its previous owner had committed the cardinal value dam-
aging sin: he had it engraved.
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