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ID - Vintage Ladies Hamilton Watch

I’m trying to determine the value of this watch I inherited from my aunt. I’ve looked through vintage Hamilton catalogs, but no luck.  The box says “Radiant SS 877086”. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much.

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ID - Vintage Ladies Hamilton Watch

Hello.  That's a beautiful watch!  I love the older mechanical watches from the USA brands like Hamilton and Elgin.

The best way to determine value and other info would be to safely open the back cover in order to look at the material of watch case and find out data from the movement.

There should be a little lip on the back cover, on one side where the band is.  Carefully lift that up.  Sometimes you can use your finger nail, but be careful not to break your nail.  Otherwise, you'll have to use a small flat head screwdriver.

The inside of the back cover should tell you the material of the case clear as day, so it could be real gold, gold filled, rolled gold plate, etc.

The back of the movement (the watch engine), should have a serial number or a movement model number.  It should also tell you the jewel count, possibly 17, 19, 21, or 23 jewels.

Let us know what you find out and I can help a little more from there.

Also, the 6 stones in the bezel are more than likely real diamonds.  Over the years, I've looked up catalogs for Hamilton, Bulova, Elgin, etc., and these very similar small ladies watches from the 1940s-1960s all came with real diamonds.

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ID - Vintage Ladies Hamilton Watch

BTW, I forgot to mention to be very careful not to scratch the back if you try to open it with a screwdriver.  If you happen to have a very solid piece of plastic, much stiffer than a credit card, that would be best to use.  Considering you have the original box, and the condition I see of the dial, it looks like it was barely worn.

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ID - Vintage Ladies Hamilton Watch

Thanks for your advice. I’ll let you know what I find out,

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ID - Vintage Ladies Hamilton Watch

Hi again.  After some further research, I'm pretty confident in saying that Radiant would be the model name or model line of the watch, with "SS" being the variation of that model.  I saw some Hamilton watch ads here on eBay from 1958-1961 that showed Hamilton Radiant women's watches, although these had "S" and "T" variations.

Bulova watches have a full online website, and many of their watches are the same.  A model name with a letter used for a variant in design differences for different years.

Nonetheless, the info on the inside still is very important.  If you can post photos of the box and this given data, that would be great.

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