Vintage Rolex Oyster Raleigh WW2 Military Men’s Watch

► ARCHIVE FILE: ROLEX — BRAND HISTORY

Rolex began in London in 1905, when Hans Wilsdorf and his brother-in-law Alfred Davis founded Wilsdorf & Davis to case Swiss movements for the British market. Wilsdorf registered the Rolex name in 1908, choosing it because it was short, easy to pronounce in any language, and fit neatly on a dial. He then set about proving that wristwatches, still dismissed as jewelry, could be precision instruments: a Rolex earned the first chronometer certificate granted to a wristwatch in 1910, a Kew Class A certificate followed in 1914, and the firm moved to Geneva in 1919.