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MARE ISLAND- VALLEJO CAUSEWAY SO CALLED DOLLAR

#1 · June 16, 2014, 4:25 pm

Quote from billycgribble on June 16, 2014, 4:25 pm
Hello,Decided to share some trivia about this silver plated Chicopee piece after seeing this piece I am picturing continually be relisted. Borrowed the picture it is not my piece although I do have a similar one. The odd thing about this piece that surfaces now and then is that while being listed as a silver plated piece with most of silver plating worn off is that examination of the piece shows that in fact the wear spots that show are the silver plating showing thru after the brown toning wears thin. This shows quite well on this piece on the fob portion. The part of the fob that gets the most wear is the shiniest silver showing on the fob. Most of these pieces are quite dark and this one has been cleaned and a lot of the brown toning removed.The trivia: This piece was made in 1915. A military unit in Chicopee was deployed to Europe to fight in WW1 shortly thereafter. With the shiny silver watch fob when they looked at their watches marksmen and snipers would aim for the bright spot causing a lot of casualties. There were obviously a lot of individuals in this unit from Chicopee that had their city anniversary piece with them. With the problem surfacing they all coated their fobs with a dark military solvent (to camaflauge them). As a side note because of these very problems the wrist watch was invented in 1917 by the military. This was especially prevalent in the artillery corps with the high loss of artillery officers. They discovered that with the trench warfare being conducted and the artillery barrages that preceded an attack that the enemy had snipers and spotters with binoculars whose job was to watch when an individual reached for his pocket watch to time the coordinated barrage between all units and have the snipers pick off all the men reaching at the same time telling them who the officers were as well as alerting them as to when an attack was about to take place. Some of these early military wrist watches which are adaptations of the pocket watch with straps are the most expensive of the military collectibles. This supposedly comes from the military history of the unit in Chicopee. Urban myth? Who knows. Just what I was told by an old time so called collector many many years ago.

Hello,Decided to share some trivia about this silver plated Chicopee piece after seeing this piece I am picturing continually be relisted. Borrowed the picture it is not my piece although I do have a similar one. The odd thing about this piece that surfaces now and then is that while being listed as a silver plated piece with most of silver plating worn off is that examination of the piece shows that in fact the wear spots that show are the silver plating showing thru after the brown toning wears thin. This shows quite well on this piece on the fob portion. The part of the fob that gets the most wear is the shiniest silver showing on the fob. Most of these pieces are quite dark and this one has been cleaned and a lot of the brown toning removed.The trivia: This piece was made in 1915. A military unit in Chicopee was deployed to Europe to fight in WW1 shortly thereafter. With the shiny silver watch fob when they looked at their watches marksmen and snipers would aim for the bright spot causing a lot of casualties. There were obviously a lot of individuals in this unit from Chicopee that had their city anniversary piece with them. With the problem surfacing they all coated their fobs with a dark military solvent (to camaflauge them). As a side note because of these very problems the wrist watch was invented in 1917 by the military. This was especially prevalent in the artillery corps with the high loss of artillery officers. They discovered that with the trench warfare being conducted and the artillery barrages that preceded an attack that the enemy had snipers and spotters with binoculars whose job was to watch when an individual reached for his pocket watch to time the coordinated barrage between all units and have the snipers pick off all the men reaching at the same time telling them who the officers were as well as alerting them as to when an attack was about to take place. Some of these early military wrist watches which are adaptations of the pocket watch with straps are the most expensive of the military collectibles. This supposedly comes from the military history of the unit in Chicopee. Urban myth? Who knows. Just what I was told by an old time so called collector many many years ago.