The Explorer That Went Underground

Rolex began in London in 1905, when a 24-year-old Hans Wilsdorf founded Wilsdorf & Davis with his brother-in-law Alfred Davis, importing precise Swiss movements into England. Wilsdorf registered the name Rolex in 1908, chosen simply because it was short, invented, and easy to say in any language, and moved the company to Geneva in 1919. In 1926 came the breakthrough that defined everything after it: the Oyster case, the world's first truly waterproof and dustproof watch case, proven a year later when swimmer Mercedes Gleitze wore one across the English Channel and it kept perfect time. In 1931, Rolex added the Perpetual rotor, the self-winding mechanism still at the heart of every automatic Rolex today. Waterproof, self-winding, and relentlessly tested in extreme conditions, that combination is the foundation the Explorer II was built on four decades later.

Rolex introduced the Explorer II in 1971 as a genuine instrument, not a lifestyle accessory. It was built for speleologists and polar explorers, the kind of people who could spend days at a time inside a cave system or above the Arctic Circle with no sunrise or sunset to mark the hours. Losing track of day and night in those conditions is not a minor inconvenience, it disrupts sleep, judgement and safety. Rolex's solution was mechanically simple and visually radical: a fixed, engraved 24-hour bezel paired with an oversized additional hand that completes one rotation every 24 hours instead of twelve. Glance at the dial and you could read, at a single fixed point, whether it was 3 in the afternoon or 3 in the morning, even in a cave with no light at all. Sales were slow at first. Cave explorers were never a large market, and the 1655 sat awkwardly next to Rolex's more famous sports watches. It took decades for collectors to catch up to what Rolex had actually built.

That oversized orange hand gave the 1655 its nickname long before it had a following: collectors call it the "Freccione", Italian for "big arrow", a name that describes exactly what you see the moment the dial catches the light. You will also see the watch called the "Steve McQueen" in some circles, but that nickname doesn't hold up. There is no evidence McQueen ever owned or wore a 1655; the watch he actually made famous on screen was a Submariner reference 5512. The Freccione earned its reputation on its own design alone, not on a Hollywood connection, which is arguably the more honest story of the two.

For most of its history, Rolex had nothing to do with the secondary market once a watch left the boutique. That changed in December 2022, when Rolex launched Rolex Certified Pre-Owned, its first official programme for authenticating watches that have already had one or more previous owners. It is not a service any dealer can offer. Only Official Rolex Retailers admitted into the programme can certify a watch, and every piece submitted is inspected using the same equipment and standards Rolex applies to brand-new watches leaving its own workshops: movement performance, case and bracelet condition, and the authenticity of every component are all checked against Rolex's own reference data. A watch that passes receives a Rolex Certified Pre-Owned seal and an official guarantee card issued by Rolex itself, alongside a fresh international guarantee, the same paperwork and confidence you would expect from buying new.

What makes this particular watch unusual is the combination. Most CPO-certified pieces are recent watches with only a few years of history. This is a genuine early-1970s tool watch, with the character and patina that only fifty years can produce, that has still been inspected and certified authentic by Rolex's own network. It is a rare middle ground between a vintage find and a brand-guaranteed purchase.

Based on its case serial number, this example dates to around 1973, placing it among the earlier years of 1655 production, before the reference went through several small dial and bezel updates over its 14-year run. The 39mm Oyster case, screw-down crown and case-back keep it water resistant to 100 metres, and inside sits the calibre 1575, a 25-jewel automatic movement beating at 19,800 vibrations per hour with roughly 48 hours of power reserve. Case, case-back and bezel wear are all recorded as barely visible, the dial and crystal show no wear at all, and the watch is offered as a genuine full set: original box, original papers, and full service papers all included, alongside a 12-month warranty from us on top of its Rolex Certified Pre-Owned status. A vintage tool watch this complete, with every original document still together, is increasingly the exception rather than the rule.

Historically significant, visually unmistakable, and independently confirmed authentic by the manufacturer itself: very few vintage sports watches let you have all three at once. This Freccione does.