BEST STORY0:33
The $17 Million Gift
A casual gift became an auction record
- Speakers
Ben GilbertHostDavid RosenthalHost
Ben GilbertHostDavid RosenthalHostWell, we start, as is so often the case with these big old European companies, back not in the last century, but even the century before that, on March 22nd in 1881 in Kulmbach, Bavaria.
About 30 miles north of Nuremberg in present-day Germany, where Hans Wilsdorf is born to young Anna and Johann Wilsdorf.
Technically, it is part of the German Empire, but this is a very, very recent development, as the Count Otto von Bismarck had only just 10 years earlier convinced Bavaria to join forces and unite with Prussia to form the greater German state, German Empire, in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War, where they battled Napoleon III over in France.
They are also Protestant, not Catholic, which puts them in the great minority in Bavaria at the time.
One, because it's sort of a fun story and, um, calls back to our Hermès and LVMH episodes, and it's gonna call back very directly to those episodes in a minute here.
But also, I think it's important to paint the picture of Hans as even from birth, he's kind of this consummate outsider.
He doesn't really fit in in any sort of national or religious identity in the either established or changing European order at the time.
He sort of floats between the seams of Europe, which Rolex itself is going to do, as we shall see, in a very big way.
His father, Johann, came from a line of successful ironmongers, and very likely Hans was destined to go into this business as well.
However, when Hans is 12 years old, tragedy strikes and both his father and his mother die within a couple months of each other.
Well, we start, as is so often the case with these big old European companies, back not in the last century, but even the century before that, on March 22nd in 1881 in Kulmbach, Bavaria.
About 30 miles north of Nuremberg in present-day Germany, where Hans Wilsdorf is born to young Anna and Johann Wilsdorf.
Technically, it is part of the German Empire, but this is a very, very recent development, as the Count Otto von Bismarck had only just 10 years earlier convinced Bavaria to join forces and unite with Prussia to form the greater German state, German Empire, in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War, where they battled Napoleon III over in France.
They are also Protestant, not Catholic, which puts them in the great minority in Bavaria at the time.
One, because it's sort of a fun story and, um, calls back to our Hermès and LVMH episodes, and it's gonna call back very directly to those episodes in a minute here.
But also, I think it's important to paint the picture of Hans as even from birth, he's kind of this consummate outsider.
He doesn't really fit in in any sort of national or religious identity in the either established or changing European order at the time.
He sort of floats between the seams of Europe, which Rolex itself is going to do, as we shall see, in a very big way.
His father, Johann, came from a line of successful ironmongers, and very likely Hans was destined to go into this business as well.
However, when Hans is 12 years old, tragedy strikes and both his father and his mother die within a couple months of each other.
Every episode on Radar is fully transcribed, speaker-labeled, and rich with metadata. Here is a taste of this one. Try Radar for free to see the rest.
3 of 11
The $17 Million Gift
A casual gift became an auction record
When Watches Became Obsolete
A new technology made mechanical watches obsolete
Apple Watch Helped Rolex
The smartwatch unexpectedly expanded the high-end market
+8 more clips · 7 min 5 sec of audio in all
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
All 11 clips — the highlight moments, each cut as its own audio, with a title and a speaker
All 20 segments — the transcript broken into labeled sections, every ad read marked
All 25 topics — jump to every other episode discussing the same subject
Every related episode — other shows Radar links to this one
No account is needed to search Radar.
