I decided to write this dairy after getting inspiration from Enoch Ro0t’s diary about his Norelco shaver.
My Aunt was born in Imperial Russia (now in the territory of modern Ukraine). She didn’t marry until her parents (My grandparents on my mother’s side) died and her husband was also from the “old country”. He had been born in Kovel (formerly Poland, now also in modern Ukraine) I understand he was a partisan against the Nazis in WW2. He died 10 years before she did. (She told me that he lied about his age when he married her, but they were both born in 1912.)
After she passed away, I inherited her house and held it for about 5-10 years. It had been vacant for a while and all her things were stored in the basement. Many things were in boxes and a lot of things were moldy. When it was time to sell the house, I started going through her things and some of the treasures that I found included this watch. It belonged to her husband, my uncle.
My future uncle came to the US in 1949 and eventually arrived in St. Louis. He was fortunate to find a job at the Edison Brothers Shoe Company when he arrived in St. Louis. He stayed there many years until he retired.
St. Louis was big in the Garment, Hat and Shoe industry when I was young.
Edison Brothers Stores, Inc., was a retail conglomerate based in St. Louis, Missouri. It operated numerous retail chains mainly located in shopping malls, mostly in the fields of shoes, clothing and entertainment, with Bakers Shoes as its flagship chain.
Remember when companies used to show gratitude for long term workers?* This watch was a present for 25 years of service. On the back, it says: In Appreciation 25 Yrs EBS
His watch is a Gruen “Precision” Autowind watch. I had to clean a lot of dirt and mold from the band after I found it, and it still looks good after all those years. Imagine my surprise when I found out that almost everything still works! I took it to my jeweler to see if they could clean it up inside and fix the date setting on the watch but they were afraid to open it. It still autowinds and actually still keeps reasonable accurate time, maybe only losing a minute every day or two.
The day on the display works correctly but I can’t correct the day of the week. I wear it almost every day.
*Now they lay you off with no severance pay and expect you to thank them for not firing you sooner.