Home now, so you can have the rest of the story ....
I was contacted today by the guy who sold me my Aristocrat DeLuxe saying he had picked up another razor and would I be interested.
'Send me some pics' I replied and received the attached.
I knew that the case was pretty special. A slide clasp case with gold imprints rather than the usual silver and different designs on the blade banks. The imprint on the bottom also doesn't have the usual $5.00 price.
The condition of the case and razor wasn't fantastic and the serial number on the razor was a G series (G306068), which would place it in 1918 in the normal course of events. So I thought it was a mis-matched set.
Anyway we negotiated a price and I picked it up.
A little further research led me to
this thread YKW.
It seems that the G prefix was for special orders and should be ignored. This leaves the serial number as 306068 - a 1905 date. The serial number on the barrel and the lack of a Gillette logo on the underside of the head confirm that it is legit set.
So it seems that a 1905 quadruple gold-plated single ring is coming my way. While the Double Rings were advertised as available in gold-plating none have ever been seen. In fact from my (albeit limited) research this afternoon the razor in the thread above is the earliest known quadruple gold-plated single ring. Sorry, let me correct that, the razor in the thread above
WAS the earliest known quadruple gold-plated single ring.
The upshot of all this is that in another world first Paste & Cut has the first pictures of the earliest example of a quadruple gold-plated single ring.
This is CLEARLY the shaving forum to frequent!
Please keep this to yourselves until it arrives - I just had to share it with you blokes.
