Time for a Pocket Watch Mystery

One of the resolutions my dad and I set for 2012 was to spend more time researching and writing about Percy Riggs, my great-uncle and the younger son of G. Oliver.  I wasn’t expecting to write a blog post about Percy this soon – five days into the new year – but one of Percy’s grandchildren posed this question to my dad and me today, and it’s too good to resist sharing:

Did G. Oliver have a pocket watch, and if so, did he give it to Percy, known by his family as Pete? 

Grandpa Pete’s pocket watch

My second cousin Chris, who lives in Texas, asked the question because he has a pocket watch that was given to him by his maternal grandmother.  Grandma Pat Riggs (who died in 1990) used to keep the watch in a display case above her television, and she’d told Chris that it had belonged to Grandpa Pete.

A close-up view of the watch face.

The watch was manufactured in 1892 by the Elgin (Illinois) Watch Company.  This was 12 years before Pete was born – so, Chris wondered, could it have originally belonged to G. Oliver?  Could it have been a gift to G. Oliver the year he started his first professional job teaching at the Iowa Wesleyan Conservatory of Music?

I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch of the imagination to think that Chris is right.  G. Oliver graduated from Oberlin College in December 1891, and he started his job at Iowa Wesleyan in September 1892.  His parents, Jasper and Rebecca, were living in Joy, Illinois, at this time.  It’s quite possible that they would have given him a such a gift.  They weren’t wealthy, but an Elgin watch would have been affordable for someone who owned a hardware business, as Jasper did; the Elgin National Watch Company was known for making millions of popular, mid-grade watches – the "working man's watch."

Grandpa Pete’s watch is not engraved, and its case was made by Keystone.

Although I have not come across any written information about G. Oliver receiving a pocket watch as a gift, or about him giving a watch to Percy, it makes sense to me, especially considering that G. Oliver gave his older son, Ronald, a different family memento – the violin that had belonged to his father, Jasper.

Plus, I did find a photo of G. Oliver in which you can see that he’s wearing a pocket watch of some kind – the watch itself is not visible, but you can see the chain connected to his vest.

G. Oliver and wife Islea with children Percy, left, Rosalie and Ronald.

It would be great if the watch contained a message from Pete or G. Oliver, so we knew its full story.  But even if we never determine its origins, it’s managed to do something that neither man would have anticpated – it’s forged a connection between branches of the family that have grown apart in the years since my great-uncle Pete and my grandfather Ronald died. 

I have never met Chris or his siblings in person, and I had never known anything about them until I started the G. Oliver project.  Now in addition to sharing great-grandparents, we share a family mystery.

Percy (Pete) with daughter Mary Jane, father G. Oliver, and daughter Islea