Cartier

Sometimes there comes a rare occurrence in time where two greats intersect, and this story takes us to two cities: New York and Paris. 

New York: 

The New York Yankees is as quintessentially New York as the Chrysler building, and one of its members is still considered to be the best baseball player of all time to this day. Joe DiMaggio was born to Italian immigrants in California and was a three-time American League Most Valuable Player Award winner and an All-Star in each of his 13 seasons. During DiMaggio’s tenure with the Yankees, the club won ten American League pennants and nine World Series championships, and he set the record for the longest hitting streak in major league baseball (56 games from May 15 – July 16, 1941). He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1955 and was voted the sport's greatest living player in a poll taken during baseball's centennial year of 1969.

As it turned out in addition to fans all over the country, Joe DiMaggio had an admirer in the form of another Greatest of All Time in the City. Where Joe DiMaggio dominated the bases, Bill Robinson dominated the ballroom. Known as one of the era defining performers of his time, Bill Robinson is most remembered for his roles alongside Shirley Temple and for defying societal and racial norms of the time period. Perhaps lesser known today is that he is also a major Yankees fan and was crowned by the New York Times as the Yankee’s No. 1 fan and the honorary mayor of Harlem.

Robinson attended games frequently and would arrange his schedule so he would always be free for the World Series. Robinson and DiMaggio eventually became friends, and DiMaggio would later be the pallbearer alongside Jackie Robinson, Duke Ellington, and Irving Berlin for Robinson’s funeral. Considered by many to be the greatest baseball player in history, Joe DiMaggio was gifted this present watch by Bill Robinson, remembered as the best known and the most highly paid black entertainer in the United States during the first half of the 20th century.

Paris

Similar to the story behind the watch, the watch itself was composed of the partnership of two horological greats. 

During the 1920s Cartier teamed up with Edmund Jaeger to form the European Watch and Clock Company. The joint venture granted Cartier exclusive access to all movements produced by Jaeger for a period of 15 years. However, Edmond Jaeger had to turn to movement specialist LeCoultre & Cie to produce the necessary quantity to fill the increasing amount of orders from Cartier. The three-way relationship turned out to be so successful that Jaeger and LeCoultre officially merged to become Jaeger-LeCoultre in 1937 and Cartier continued to rely on movements provided by the firm for decades. Watches bearing movements that exemplify this three-way partnership have since become highly sought after for their rarity and technological ingenuity for the time. 

We are honored to present the present lot: a true marriage between two Grandes Maisons and their respective horologic know-hows, and between two of the Greatest of All Times in American sports and entertainment.