What Are the Origins of the Zodiac Sea Wolf?
1960s Zodiac Sea Wolf ref. 722-964B)
Zodiac is a company we haven’t talked about enough, in particular because they have an array of iconic vintage watch models that merit mention. One such model is the Zodiac Sea Wolf, our subject for today.
Zodiac was founded in 1882 by Ariste Calame as a workshop for the production of watches. The company made pocket watches up until the 1930s, in the 1920s gaining prominence for their 1924 invention of a flat pocket watch movement; the Zodiac Caliber 1617. However, it was in the mid-20th century that they started to look below the waves for their next innovation. In 1953, at Baselworld, the Zodiac Sea Wolf was released to the world in the very same halls as the Blancpain Fifty Fathom! In fact, the Rolex Submariner was released the following year. The Sea Wolf was one of the very first commercial dive watches – the first dive watch with a rotating bezel – launched with a depth rating deeper than that of the Fifty Fathoms, and yet it gets barely any attention for such an achievement!
Now, you could say this is the fault of the marketing team, but even collectors seem to hold the Sea Wolf to lower esteem; as is reflected in their prices.
Old Zodiac Sea Wolf advertisement
Early versions of the Zodiac Sea Wolf used A. Schild movements, which had been in use by the brand since before the release of the iconic model. These models were marked ‘Especially Water Tested’ and had newly designed snapback casebacks. Then, in the early 1960s, Zodiac along with a group of other Swiss watchmakers (Doxa, Eberhard, Favre-Leuba, and Girard-Perregaux), joined together to modify the A. Schild movements, creating the automatic Zodiac Caliber 70-72 (72 was the date version). These new movements had 40-hour power reserves and 21,600 bph rates, they went on to be used by the brands for quite some time.
On the other hand, the Sea Wolf bezel also saw a few iterations, especially in the early days. Early Sea Wolf bezels had brass plating, making it rare to see one in good condition today. Bakelite bezels were eventually introduced for the Sea Wolf, which had been in use by the competing Fifty Fathoms for some time now.
Along with the new movement, the Zodiac Sea Wolf also saw the addition of a date window in the 1960s – the Zodiac Sea Wolf Datographic was born.
Zodiac Sea Wolf with gilt dial. Circa 1960s. / Credit: Bulang & Sons
The Sea Wolf continued to be upgraded throughout the 1960s and 1970s, including more colourful models. The Zodiac Sea Wolf also became famous around that time, as a never-found California serial killer in the ‘60s and ‘70s known as the ‘Zodiac Killer’ used the Zodiac watches symbol as his calling card! A Zodiac Seawolf was worn by Arthur Leigh Allen, the Zodiac Killer portrayed by John Carroll Lynch, in popular movie Zodiac (2007) about the serial killer. It was also said that Arthur Leigh Allen, who was a real-life suspect in this string of murders, owned a Zodiac Sea Wolf wristwatch!
Despite the fame of being one of the first dive watches on the market, and starring in a famous film, the Sea Wolf still finds itself at the bottom of many wish lists today. For some reason, all these real, laudable achievements never translated to demand for the timepieces. And although the Sea Wolf was produced in high volumes, it is rather difficult to find one in good condition – meaning they will only start to get rarer as time goes on.
By: Eric Mulder