# Mortima



## dombox40 (Oct 20, 2008)

Just a bit of an interesting story, I sold a watch on ebay yesterday and got the princely sum of Â£62 for it which was way above my expectations, so I decided to ivestigate the buyers feedback turns out he is a big collector of French watches and he lives in the town of Morteau in eastern France which is on the Swiss border.I happen to know that Morteau is the town where Mortima watches were made for many years so out of interest I wrote to the buyer and ask him if he had any information on the factory which I thought would be long gone. He wrote back to me confirming the factory had shut many years ago but he was now a teacher in the university that teaches the art of watch repairing and watch making and have courses that range from 2 to 6 years depending on how qualified you want to become, so from basic watch repairing to watch design and a lot of the students end up working in the Swiss watch houses just over the border. It,s nice to see the watch I sold him has gone back to It,s home town and the watch industry is still thriving there, they also have a museum. I also bet he does not have any problem getting his collection repaired and serviced. A piccy of the watch is below.


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## MarkF (Jul 5, 2003)

I remember you posting that watch pic before, wish I could have bought it.  Mortima had some wonderful designs, basic pin pallet movements in many keep them affordable and I think they are lovely, "of their time" along with Sicura, Bessa and others. I'd love to know more about Mortima.

Mine, a recent arrival from Spain.


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## Dunnster (Dec 28, 2009)

That is really interesting dombox! I would love to look round that museum. Thanks for posting.

Matt


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## Barryboy (Mar 21, 2006)

I once had a Mortima 'Commandant Du Bord' diver which I moved on about 3 years ago... It wasn't anything special, as I recall, but there was a story that Mortima were one of the sponsors of Jacques Cousteau and the commandant Du Bord was issued to crew of the Calypso. So there was a chance that my watch just could have been on 'ze Calypso'- a lovely thought, but totally unproveable, of course.

However I have managed to dig out a little background info on Mortima...

'Mortima was founded in 1926 by Ã‰mile Cattin (1904-1979). The company was located in Marteu, near Villiers le Lac, and was associated from 1947 onwards with Martial Vuillemin. All told some 30 000 watches were made, largely for the French, Spanish and American markets, and the company made watches under a number of different names, such as KiplÃ©. The quartz revolution devastated the company. The watches were simple and robust, as one would expect from pin-lever movements. They went out of business in 1990.'

Here's a French blog if your cross-Channel parlez is decent enough (or you can use Yahoo Babel).

http://watchmontre.blogspot.com/2008/09/mortima-cattin.html

All the best

Rob


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## Uncle Alec (Feb 14, 2011)

I'd like to know why the Mortima in the first photo has an ammeter. That must be some kinetic movement!


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## sam. (Mar 24, 2010)

Great story dombox,i couldn't think of a better place for it to go,and it was well worth sending him that message! :thumbsup:

BTW,did he tell you how to get that flipping light working!


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