An oxford gray that got away

[allnumbedup]

I have had a run of good luck finding diamonds in the rough on online auctions and sales sites. Although I know a lot of the fun is in the hunt, the following is the sad tale of one that did not work out and was nothing but trouble frome the start.

The seller had several poorly described phones on FB market place, each with one picture. There were two broken AE40's, the one pictured below, a north gallion, and a 1970's candlestick she was asking $100 for. I live in NC and she lived in Kentucky so too far to drive. I was surprised when the seller agreed to ship the oxford gray I wanted which she was calling a "1940's phone"   I was thinking it could be an early two tone 1953 or 54 oxford gray.  She said she put the phone aside for me and marked it sold while she set up a paypal account, figured out how to accept money, and figured out how to pack it up and mail it.  Several weeks later, I  paid $50 (for the phone and shipping), and soon she sent me a photo of the package before she mailed and I recieved it four days later.  However, the package contained the metal cased North Gallion she also had for sale.  This was a decent phone for restoration as it had a North dial with a celluloid dial face.  When I contacted her about the mistake, I offered to keep the North phone she mailed and pay again for the one I really wanted. Mostly because I felt bad for her because the North phone cost her $22 to mail and she seemed like she was really trying her best. 

Soon after I paid her again though, things deteriorated even more.  Next I heard from her was with a picture of a package she said the post office  had returned to her "for some reason" which she said contained the oxford gray. ( The labels on it appear that she mailed it to herself by poor placement of the address labels).  Last I heard from her was weeks later when she wrote that her husband was going to mail it again because she wasn't feeling well.  After this her whole FB acccount and FB marketplace items dissappeared to me so I may have been blocked or worse she was ill or died.  A month later I found her account after it re-appeared on FB again, and sent a polite and concerned messenger request to send the phone.  She responded with a request for more money with different grammar and language that lead me to believe the account had been hacked.  I reported it to FB without a response and mailed a letter of  warning to the physical address the phone came from and another address I found in a magazine she used to pack the North.  (Yes, the North was loose in the box between two very heavy magazines with another taped around the handset.)  I  kept getting annoying messages from her account asking for money until I blocked it and haven't seen any of her other phones or this oxford gray on FB again.

[MMikeJBenN27]

Too bad, soft plastic nowadays is pretty rare, unless it is black.

Mike

[poplar1]

I think Paypal will open a case if you paid for an item and did not receive it.

BTW, that's not a two-tone 500. It is "full color." Early oxford gray 500s had black dials, because matching oxford gray number plates were not yet ready. All two-tone sets have black dials but also black handsets and black dials. Only the housing is in color other than black.

Early full color Oxford Gray, Red, Yellow, and Mediterranean Blue all had black dials, but matching color handsets.

In addition to the oxford gray 500, some early 500 full color sets also have "neutral" (gray) cords: Green, Red, Yellow, Rose Beige, Mediterranean Blue.

Ivory, Brown and Gray sets always had matching cords. Mediterranean Blue 500s almost always have neutral (gray) cords.

[allnumbedup]

Paypal versus Xoom:

I was willing to send the second payment precisely because I thought Paypal is pretty good at getting one's money back. I did not fully understand until later that I sent money through Xoom which is owned by Paypal but set up more for personal than business use. It doesn't hold on to the $ like Paypal does and I couldn't get it back. So a word to the wise: these payment methods are different.

What is a true Two-tone WE 500?

From previously posted discussions on this format and documents on TCI, it looks to me like Two Tones did sometimes have black dials and colored handsets as well. We won't and can't know for sure if this one originally came this way, changed out post production by a subscriber, or messed with by a collector in the last 70 years.  It's hard to imagine a situation where a subscriber would demote a full color set to a black dial set. Maybe an upgrade from a manual set? It is also hard to imagine a collector doing the same. But you never know.... and can't 100% know even if the underlying dial is well date and color code matched I suppose.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=4683.msg59745#msg59745
https://www.telephonecollectors.org/JournalsSamples/2009-05sw1.pdf
http://www.telephonecollectors.info/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_details&gid=3697&Itemid=2

[poplar1]

The photo you attached shows 4 full color sets (Page 4 of 16 of the linked pamphlet for employees). The gray set is exactly like the one you were trying to buy: gray housing, gray handset, gray cords, and black dial.

Note the text about the 4 full color sets (yellow, gray, red and blue) that still had black dials in 1954:

YELLOW, GRAY, RED, and BLUE. Here are
the other four colors in the telephone rainbow. Note
that these sets are equipped with contrasting black dials.
These four telephones will soon be in production in
full color with matching dials and transparent finger
wheels like those on the preceding pages.

The two-tone sets are on page 5 of the same booklet. Note that they all have black cords, black dials, and black handsets.

[allnumbedup]

ohhh. gotcha

[MMikeJBenN27]

Some years ago, I bought a Mediterranean Blue 500 from 1954.  It had an ivory dial face, which I knew was wrong, but I didn't at that time know I was supposed to have a black dial face and metal fingerwheel, so I replaced that face with a matching, but much newer, Mediterranean Blue face.  I think the late production 1954s had a matching dial face, but most did not.

Mike

[MMikeJBenN27]

The 50s/60s tu-tone sets were to mimic the paint scheme on some cars - red with a black top, black and white, pink and black, etc., the shell being one color, and the handset and dial face being black.  Tu-tones were brought back in, I think, the 80s, and I don't know what the color schemes were on those.  As for later single-color sets with a black dial face, usually red, yellow, or grey, maybe Ma Bell would run out of correct color dial faces in those colors, or maybe they were originally manual sets like you say.  Ma Bell sometimes worked in strange ways!

Mike