Paul Newman

The story

Joanne Woodward gave Newman a Daytona engraved 'DRIVE CAREFULLY ME' when he took up motor racing. He wore it so often that collectors nicknamed its exotic dial the 'Paul Newman' — turning a slow-selling variant into the most coveted vintage Rolex on earth. In 2017 his personal watch sold at auction for $17.8 million, then a world record for any wristwatch.

Facts

• The 'exotic dial' Daytonas sold so poorly in the 1960s that dealers discounted them — today they trade for hundreds of times their original price.
• Newman gave the watch to his daughter's boyfriend James Cox in 1984 with the words 'here, here's a watch'.
• The caseback is engraved 'DRIVE CAREFULLY ME' — Joanne Woodward's words, not a factory marking.
• Cox consigned the watch to Phillips in New York in October 2017, where it sold for $17,752,500 including premium — then a world record for any wristwatch at auction.
• The buyer has never been publicly identified. The hammer fell to an anonymous telephone bid and the watch's current owner remains unconfirmed.
• Newman raced seriously rather than ceremonially: he finished second overall at Le Mans in 1979, aged 54.