The Caseback Issue 1: Under Pressure
Hey friends,
Welcome to the very first issue of The Caseback.
If you've been reading It's About Time for a while, you know how the weekday newsletter works. Watches come out, I write about them, and by Friday there's a new pile. I love doing it, but it never left room for the stuff I actually spend my weekends reading about: why things are built the way they are, who built them, and the odd stories that sit behind them. A lot of that stuff isn't about watches at all.
So that's what this is, a new weekend magazine from IAT. Every issue gets one theme, a long read in the middle, and a handful of shorter things around it. Some of it will be watches. Some of it will be a pen, or a film, or a place I went. The only rule is that it has to be something I'd want to read slowly on a Sunday morning.
This first issue is free for everyone. From next Sunday, The Caseback goes out to paying subscribers only, but if you grab the subscription now, you can get it at a discount until the end of the weekend. If you enjoy this one, I'd love for you to stick around. If you don't, reply and tell me why. I read every reply.
-Vuk
Your Next Watch
Ten Vintage Divers For Sale Right Now, From A $389 Citizen To A €21,900 Jaeger-LeCoultre With An Alarm
Ten dive watches you can buy this week, from a $389 Citizen Parawater to a 1967 Jaeger-LeCoultre Polaris with an alarm built to be heard underwater. In between: the first diver with a mechanical depth gauge, an IWC made for German Navy combat divers, and a Certina worn by aquanauts who lived on the seabed.
The Long, Leaky History Of Keeping Water Out Of A Watch
By 1927 the hard part of a water-resistant watch was already obvious: the crown, the one hole in the case you have to keep using. Here's how watchmakers dealt with it, and what the number on your caseback actually means. Read it on the site →
The Long Read
The Deepest Company in the World
In 1992, a Comex diver spent two hours at a pressure equal to 701 meters below the sea, without ever getting wet. It's still the record. The company behind it started in a garage with an old compressor, tested Omegas, a Doxa and a long line of Rolexes that were never sold to the public, and became the testing ground for the first helium escape valves. Most of us know Comex as a word on a dial. The rest of the story is much stranger.
Odd One Out
The Zlatoust 191ChS Is A 60mm Soviet Navy Diver With No Bezel And No Agreed Depth Rating
Around 260 grams of solid steel, a radium dial, a crown cap on a chain, and no rotating bezel at all. Nobody can even agree on how deep it was rated to go. It's one of the strangest dive watches ever made.
Carry
The Fisher Space Pen And Why You Need One Now
The Bullet's shape dates to 1948. And all these years later, it is one of the best ball-point-pens you can buy.
Dead Seconds, A Column
Nobody Really Needs A 1,000-Meter Dive Watch. Or Do They?
Most of us have never been deeper than a few meters, and our watches are rated for hundreds. This week I argue that depth ratings are fiction, that enthusiasts are the reason they keep getting bigger, and that I'm happy to live with all of it. Up to a point.
That’s the first one. Thanks for reading all the way down here. See you next Sunday. If you liked this issue, let me know. If you didn't, that goes double.
-Vuk
P.S. Next week’s issue goes to paying subscribers only. If you want to keep getting it, subscribe now and the launch discount is yours.
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