Circassian Walnut VV-230 from Facebook Marketplace

[audiophile102]

What a great find. It is a rare and beautiful example, but with all the extras it's a grand slam home run. Thanks for sharing your story and photos.

[BillH_NJ]

Beautiful! My wife is not going to want any more machines in the house—she didn’t want the last couple I got—but she has always said she would make an exception if I found a Circassian walnut one.

[Granby]

I tend to be an "off brand" guy but who doesn't love a Victrola like this? Absolutely beautiful.... congratulations! - Chris

[tictalk]

We picked this Circassian 16 up two weeks ago in the wild, Does anyone know if they offered different finishes on the Circassians , I have two Victors both with original finish , but one has more of a satin , and this one has a heavier gloss finish.

[Django]

“We picked this Circassian 16 up two weeks ago in the wild, Does anyone know if they offered different finishes on the Circassians , I have two Victors both with original finish , but one has more of a satin , and this one has a heavier gloss finish.“

Mine is satin on the inside and gloss on the exterior.

That is a beautiful XVI. Nice find. Does it have the albums? How did you come across it?

[Django]

Congratulations!

The VV-230 is a lovely machine in any wood species, but the Circassian is especially nice.

These Circassian 230s are a mystery to me. A few have turned up, but where did Victor obtain that Circassian? Conventional wisdom is that the Russian Revolution disrupted the supply of Circassian Walnut, and that Victor shifted to American Walnut as a more expedient special finish. The VV-230 wasn't introduced until August 1922; well after the Bolsheviks took over. Was there a short-lived trade in Circassian in the early 1920s? Was a small cache of this wood discovered at this time? I'd be interested in knowing.

We showed a Circassian VV-230 (serial number 1000) in A World of Antique Phonographs on pages 184-185. Since then I've seen at least two more.

Again, congratulations!

George P.

I don't know if this information will help. The catalog that was in the record storage appears to have been published in October 1924. The only wood options for a 230 at that time were American Walnut and Mahogany, (by 1924 the only 230 machines that were available were leftovers, so they may not have had any left in Circassian Walnut. Victrola 230 machines were only produced in 1922 and 1923. They built too many, so the 230 remained in the catalogs until 1925. My machine is serial number 3568, so it was near the end of production, but still produced by 1923. This 1924 catalog has only one machine with the option of Circassian Walnut, and that is the Victrola 330 non-electric machine, which is proof that they still had a supply of Circassian Walnut in the 1920s. All Victrola 330 machines were produced in 1922, so it is likely that Victor still had some Circassian 330 machines in their stock. Being that they rarely used Circassian Walnut, I suspect that they were using up the supply that they already had prior to the Revolution.