Certina

 By Bruce Shawkey

There are certain watch brands that vintage watch collectors just don’t want you to know about! They like the idea of fishing in uncrowded streams and rivers, while the masses troll in futility for bargains in the overfished waters of brands like Rolex and Omega.

                 One of those brands is Certina. Despite a long history and the fact that they made most, if not all, of their movements in house (a rarity among watch manufacturers) vintage Certina watches for years barely registered a blip on collectors’ radar screens when I last wrote about them in 2007.

That has changed. Many collectors today are eagerly seeking vintage Certina watches for their quality, and relative low price.  Despite upward pressure, many pieces on eBay and other venues still go for less than $200

 

The story of Certina begins in 1888, when brothers Adolph (right) and Alfred Kurth opened a small business in Grenchen, Switzerland, offering movements and supplies to the watchmaking industry. They started with three employees in a workshop annexed to the family home. The name “Kurth” and “Kurth Freres” (brothers) is important to remember. Because while most collectors know the company as “Certina,” this is merely a brand name. “Kurth Freres” was the company name, right up until 1983 when Certina became a division of Swatch Group. To this day, when ordering a part for a vintage (pre 1980s) Certina watch movement, you (or your watchmaker) must specify the appropriate Kurth movement.

Finally, by 1906, the company felt confident enough to begin making complete watches with “discrete high-quality watch movements,” according to the company’s website. That’s a

fancy way  of saying their watches weren’t signed on the dials — a common practice in its day.  They chose the name "Grana," a short form of "Granacus," which is Latin for Grenchen, the city where Kurth Freres was founded. The first wrist watches that appeared on the market were mostly ladies' models. A rare gent’s watch is pictured at left. It was only available in a base metal case. I suppose the Kurth brothers thought — as many companies did at that time — that men’s wrist watches were a passing fad.

At first, dials on both men’s and ladies’ were not signed. I was fortunate enough to locate a 1920s Kurth catalog of Grana watches, and by this time,

men's watches were fairly well represented (above). Probably due in part to Alfred Kurth’s sons Erwin and Hans joining the company during this time. The full version of this story contains some rare full color images of the ladies' watches which are fabulous and rival those designs of the Elgin Parisienne series.

Also, remember the Grana name. The company kept the name, “Grana” alive for many years. notably WWII British military issue watches. The “official” history of Certina from the company website states the name began to fade in 1949, but we see the name pop up into the 1950s and beyond. And Swatch Group (which currently owns Certina) retains the Grana trademark to this day.

The year 1938 marked the company’s 50th anniversary, and they went looking for a new brand name. They chose “Certina,” a word that is pronounced the same in most any language, and which is derived from the root Latin word certus meaning “sure.” The name was trademarked in 1939.

Early Grana and even early Certina watches are difficult to find in the United States. Their primary market up until 1952 was Europe, emphasis on Great Britain. There is no evidence that Certina watches were even distributed in America prior to ‘52 when the Illinois Watch Case Co. (a division of Elgin)  cased a few models and offered them for sale. More on this later.

A rare example of an early Certina, probably a late ’30s wire-lug specimen, is shown  at left. It has a partial dust cover that protects critical parts of the movement, and an extremely tight snapback cover. It shows that Kurth was already thinking about water/dust protection.

Another Certina model line,  the “Labora,” (circa '40s into the '50s) was pitched as a working man's wrist watch (labor, get it?), and offered a screwback case for better protection from dirt and moisture. An ad for the Labora  (from a 1946 Swiss trade journal) is seen below.

OK, remember I said we’d revisit the Grana brand name? It appears again in a big way during and for the first few years after WWII with the British Ministry of Defense (MoD). Remember, Kurth was still not established in the United States until after 1952, so it missed out on military contracts with the United States. It turns out Kurth won a contract for a general service watch to the MoD, and supplied a humble 15-jewel model with sub seconds and the traditional “broad arrow” on the dial (right).

Today, it is one watch comprising the so-called "Dirty Dozen," (referring to a classic WWII movie starring Lee Marvin) a term coined by modern-day military watch collectors to denote all the general service watches commissioned by the MoD from various suppliers during World War II. To collect all 12 is considered a Holy Grail achievement among vintage military watch collectors. The Grana is the rarest of the bunch, with estimates of fewer than 1,500 pieces supplied. 

To continue with the chronology, Kurth developed its first automatic movement, the Caliber 360, in 1951. Winding in one direction only, it differed little from its competitors. The first full-rotor movement, the 11-1/2 ligne, Caliber 25-45, was also introduced in 1951 and featured a unique double-lever switcher that functions like the more common switching rocker found in other automatic calibers. The coupling wheel which disconnects the automatic drive during hand winding, also has a unique design. A date version of this Caliber, designated the 25-451, was also introduced and given the name "Certidate."

The 25-45 had a long production run, and was used not only in Certina watches, but sold as ebauches (rough movements) to other watch manufacturers. I recently sold a Gubelin automatic that was equipped with a Kurth 25-45, and the smooth accurate mechanics were a perfect mate to the gorgeous case and dial of the watch. When you wind the watch by hand, it’s as smooth as a baby’s bottom and requires very little torque.

Somewhere around this time, Kurth also developed a new logo for Certina. It is a “C” inside of a larger “C,” with both letters set at opposing angles. I’m just speculating here, but I believe the larger C stands for Certina, while the smaller inside C is a representation of the  rotor inside an automatic watch.

We also know that as early as the late 1930s, Certina started experimenting with case designs that would protect the watch movement from the elements. Unlike other brands, however, Kurth used these designs not only in sports models, but dress models as well. The early Certina (long rectangle) model above is an example. It has a partial dust cover that protects certain vital parts of the movement, and an extremely tight snapback case.

You can witness their evolution in watertight case design by our next example, shown at left. Again, it bridges the gap between sport and dress watches. It features a gold-capped case, and at first glance looks very much like a dress watch. But when you flip it over, the back reveals separate bracket pieces located on the top and bottom that compress the back against the bezel as the screws are tightened. A special crystal has a lip all around the edges, and is compressed against a gasket which, in turn, is pressed against the case.

The original dial reveals the letters “EA” in script below the signature. The "EA," stands for "Elgin American" or “Export America” (historians differ) signifying the case was made by the Illinois Watch Case Co. (owned by Elgin) and intended for the U.S. market. By most accounts, this was Certina's initial foray into the U.S. market in 1953.

In 1959, Certina introduced its first "DS" model standing for “double-security.” Example at

right. It featured a reinforced case design, and a special suspension for the movement. Multiple models were soon rolled out (manual, automatic, date models, chronograph, divers’ models, and so forth) and soon the DS series became Certina’s signature line. An upgraded “DS-2” series was introduced in 1968 and featured several technical innovations. Swatch maintains the DS series in Certina’s sport line of watches to this day. They are up to generation “DS 8” in the progression of technical improvements.

In 1971, Certina joined General Watch Holding Co., a subsidiary of the ASUAG consortium. This was common practice during the turbulent times of cheap Japanese imports that were disrupting the Swiss market. Additional members were Edox/Era, Endura, Eterna, Longines, Mido, Rado, Rotary and Technos. But General could not withstand the onslaught of the quartz invasion of the late '70s and early '80s, and they began selling off their brands one by one. As noted earlier, Swatch Group acquired Certina in 1983. Since then, Swatch Group has resurrected many of Certina's model names of old. In my humble opinion, their achievements over the last 40 or so years have been mostly flash over substance. Their watches are all fitted with ebauches from ETA, which is now another one of the Swatch affiliates. Press releases play on the brand's heritage, and are filled with news about celebrity endorsements rather than technological advances. One example is the Powermatic 80, announced in 2014 as a technological breakthrough. It now powers the lion’s share of Certina’s automatic watches. It's just a basic ETA Caliber 2824 with a power reserve of 80 hours upgraded from 38 hours. Big whoop! I'll admit I am biased toward the Certina watches of old (’60s and before), but there's just something unsettling about the post-1983 Certina watches. They simply lack the soul of the vintage Certinas. Don't get me wrong. I completely understand that Certina watches with the modern ETA and Valjoux (chronograph) movements are better in almost every way from the Kurth movements of old. I just like vintage watches!

Here are previous articles I've writen on Certina:

I came across an ad in the March/April 1954 issue of Swiss Horological Journal, announcing a new automatic watch. I was a very simple model with sweep seconds hand hand and date. It didn't even have a model name. Certina simply ran the ad to keep the brand name alive in jewelers' minds. Even Coca Cola runs print ad from time to time! Certina, as most collectors know, was founded by brothers Adolf and Alfred Kurth in Grenchen in 1888. The brand name is from the Latin root "certus" meaning "certain." They made great watches in the day. Today, they are part of Swatch Group.