James Dean had a lucky golden pocket watch, with a chain attached to it that was given to him by his estranged father. It dangled from his belt loop as he brooded through East of Eden. Hell, if you asked him, it might have been what got him the role in Eden, his first big break. He bought the watch toward the end of '51 — though it was made by Standard USA circa 1889, at a time when American watchmakers were giving the Swiss a real run for their money — which was around the occasion of his move to New York City. It's said he credited it with the good luck that helped him meander through television toward Hollywood.

And now you can own it. If you're lucky enough to win it, that is. Auction house Antiquorum is putting the watch up for auction on the 22nd of June, in Hong Kong. The cost sits at a pre-auction estimate of $5,000-$10,000. No small investment, it's true. But consider the rest of the heirloom's story.

When he got to Los Angeles for his Eden audition, Dean visited his father, who'd sent him to live with his aunt after Dean's mother died of cancer when he was nine years old. During the visit, his father gave him the chain to keep him from losing the watch and its luck.

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On the set of Eden, Dean insisted on letting the watch hang off his waist, despite the director hating it. He also met and developed a close friendship with a woman named Tillie Starriet, who became the only person he'd let style his hair into that classic windblown tuft in the film, and then in Rebel Without a Cause. Dean began calling Starriet, who was significantly older than him, "Mom," and in the letter that accompanies the watch, she says that she cherishes two gifts from Dean: a letter from him that read, "To Mom," and that lucky golden watch and chain, which she used to tease and joke with him about on set.

Dean did not have the watch with him when he fatally crashed his car in '55, while speeding westward down Route 466, preparing for some weekend races. He'd already given the watch to Starriet by then. But it's since been set and stopped at the time he died that evening: 5:43.