Here's a new one on me.

[AtomicEraTom]

Back then, cars had those between the bumper and body parts.
 

And I HATE them!!!!  They get brittle and fall apart.  That's what happened between the front bumper and header panel on my Caprice Wagon.  And now the signal wires are exposed to the elements!

[jsowers]

Interesting Jonathan, is it a real "original" Mahogany dial bezel??

It "taps" like hard plastic to me, but I haven't taken it loose from the dial to see if it has MPCo on it. I can tap the handset and it's dull. But tapping the dial bezel is sharp. I wonder if maybe it was a retirement gift to someone from Illinois Bell who liked Mahogany Brown? It's very lightly used, considering almost any action on the handset would have rubbed off the paint on the cradle. The paint is mostly still there.

I think it looks good too. It's in my office filling the Mahogany Brown spot, where putting a real Mahogany Brown would be risky. The shelf could fall or someone could get sticky fingers.

[Jim Stettler]

I have seen phone company painted cords before. Hardwired handset Black on blue.
I have also seen painted mod cords. The ones I had were yellow painted yellow. The easy way to tell if a mod cord is painted is that they used a "smoky" tint plastic for the ends vs clear ends.

The yellow painted cords I had were packaged and some were marked bell system "B" stock and some had the Telephone Pioneers emblem.

These cords appeared to of been dipped in the same (polane) paint that they painted plastic phones with.

Jim S.

[Tonyrotary]

I never knew paint could be that flexible. But what about today? If your cord need to be repainted can you get that kind of paint?

[Jim Stettler]

The Polane paint is about $50.00 a gallon and should be used once it is opened. It is better to just clean your old cord if you can.

Sandman.com and phoneco both advertise cord cleaners.
 There used to be a place in AK that would paint a phone for you. The lady was a retired bell employee that used to paint phones. She charged by the piece, but wouldn't paint until she had 50 pieces of the same color.

A 500 set is 4 pieces, housing, handle and 2 caps.

Jim S.