`Highway Gold` - A fake luxury watch
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In the sixties and seventies, on gas station on the transit highways in southern europe, fake watches, heavy and gold-toned, were sold to travellers, which were in a hurry. These travellers believed, that they made a great deal, but when they later had to bring the watch to a watchmaker, their "highway gold" watches were discovered as fakes, which of course, did not contain a milligram of real gold.
The speciem shown here is a rather nice one, it was not often worn (maybe it was the "good" sunday watch) and so the very thing golden-toned color did not yet wash off. And when these watches were seen as an investement and not worn very often, their simple pin-lever movements did not cause trouble, too.
Btw - if you ever spot "Antimagnetic" on a such a watch, you can be assured, that it is a fake,
since the manufactureres of the original watches would never print such a matter of course
on a dial
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The very large gold "hallmark" on the back is pure fantasy. As you can see, large parts of the golden color of the back are already worn off.
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On the inner side of the clasp, you also see a "gold hallmark", but this one is made very badly, maybe the person, who engraved it, did not really have joy on his job. But on a quick sale on a highway, you probably won't notice this detail
The movement is a swiss EB 8481-74, made by Ebauches Bettlach. For such a fake watch, it is a pretty good one, but generally, it's only a pin lever movement and won't guarantee good precision and longevity - unlike the famous brand, printed on the dial.
A final remark: On each picture, the faked original manufactuers' name was hidden to ensure, that on one might think, that this is a real watch.