Western Electric 302 won in January.

[bingster]

It's a fact that although the Bell System in Canada and the Bell System in the US shared most methods at the time, they did do many things differently.  It's a very real possibility that phones painted this way were available from Northern Electric, even though we'd probably never see them from Western Electric.

[Dan/Panther]

My take.
Northern Electric was on a tighter budget at the time, and to have plated or clear finger wheels, would have been an added expense, hence the painted fingerwheels.
JMHO, but since I've found two, N.E. phones painted the exact same color from different locations, I tend to lean towards authentic.
D/P