Seiko

Seiko Pogue - 6139 6002, 1969-78

The 6139 is truly exciting. It has all the elements of a legendary watch: a design story, a human story and a technical story.

In terms of design, I find it so titillating the mix of a bicolour tachymeter bezel, an inner rotating bezel and a day-date display. This is absolutely bonkers considering that the concatenation of complications mixes elements from racing, diving and dress, all the while lacking a seconds hand.

Mixing these elements isn’t without its technical challenges. It is said that the Pogue is among the first automatic chronographs produced and sold to the public across the planet. This in competition with Zenith, Heuer, Breitling and Hamilton-Buren. Moreover, the watch also has an extremely intricate crown that controls the time, day, date and inner bezel. Pushing the crown inward, while varying pressure, changes the day and date, turning the crown activates the inner bezel, and finally, pulling on the crown changes the time. Not bad for an automatic chronograph from 69!

In terms of human story, the 6139 is just as exciting and derives its nickname from the audacious Colonel who brought it up to space along with his NASA approved Speedmaster. Colonel Pogue had used the 6139 in training and found it legible and reliable, both rational reasons for bringing a watch to space.

This is my first Seiko but my n^th vintage piece. In comparison, the Pogue keeps very good time and is just as charming as my Lemanias and Jardurs. If I had to say one thing though is that the finish is a bit rough but I’m starting to see that this comes with the territory.

I mentioned that the Pogue had all the characteristics of a legend. Unfortunately, I think this isn’t completely true due to the high number of units produced. That being said, the ones made in 69 and distributed to the Japanese market, also known as JDMs, are rarer and a good target for collectors looking for pearls. At least, this is my understanding.

Enough waffle, below are some pictures of my two recent acquisitions. These are not rare models, however I initially focused on getting unpolished pieces as I like the sharp geometric shapes, each with their own individually polished surface.

Hope you enjoy the text and pictures. I think I might have more 6139s to show soon!