A guest on the BBC's Antiques Roadshow was struck with a realisation that left him in tears after he presented antiques expert Richard Price with a Rolex which had been bought for just £132.
If there's one show that makes you want to clean out your house, it's Antiques Roadshow.
Advert
After seeing just how valuable some of those items are, you can't help but wonder whether your baking dish gathering dust in the cupboard is actually the rare work of a designer, or whether the old pen you found under the desk once belonged to a king.
For the most part, I can tell you that's probably not the case. But sometimes - just sometimes - people stumble across some real treasure.
One such lucky man appeared on Antiques Roadshow, where he presented Price with a Rolex watch which had previously belonged to his late father.
The guest explained: “It was my dad’s watch. He bought it for himself in 1972 when I was seven and me, my mum, my dad and my brother went to Birmingham to buy it.
“My dad passed away in October and he gave it to me a couple of months before he passed away. It means absolutely everything to me. It’s part of my dad. It’s a very, very special watch that is and it will be forever."
The dad had originally paid £132 for the watch, and though he'd changed the strap over the years he'd always kept the original, which was confirmed by a date engraved on it.
After taking a look at the watch, Price told viewers it was a genuine vintage Submariners Rolex watch, which had been introduced in 1967.
"It had the word Submariner written in red, which is why collectors call it the red submariner," Price said. “Around nine or ten years later, this was changed and all that writing was in white.”
"Watch collectors – particularly Rolex collectors – are pedantic and within that ten-year period, this watch was made with six different types of dial," Price continued.
“But the important thing to see is that yours has feet first – the first three dials, it was metres first and we refer to those as marks 1, 2, 3.”
This particular watch, however, was a mark four, meaning it was the first of three different dials with feet first.
With all of that in mind, it was time for Price to deliver his verdict.
He told the guest: "I hope you guys are going to be really, really pleased with this. It’s going to be around the £20,000 mark."
How's that for a profit?
Price told the guest the watch was a 'great inheritance' for the family, saying: “It’s something you’ve obviously loved and you’re going to keep it forever. It was your dad’s and I think that’s a lovely, lovely story."
Naturally the guest was overwhelmed to hear that the previously £132 watch was now worth thousands, with the news leaving him tearing up and almost lost for words.
It must be a pretty nice feeling. Now, I'm off to check my jewellery box.
Topics: Antiques Roadshow, Money, TV and Film
Emily Brown