I gave some thought to this "C" in narrowing down the actual production year after i got 2 of these 4425’s,both had the letter "C."
Mr. Scratch’s article and info is of great help. Very interesting.

A bit of speculation follows ,even though in all reality it doesn’t really matter IMHO:
As Evinrude knew they were not going to continue this model,It appears that the "C" used in the serial # is used to designate the last motors, not knowing how long it would take to sell this seemingly large batch. It seems they had lots of motors to assemble and clear out of the factory after they knew the model end was near.
Could they have been in dealers stock in the fall of 1949 all over the US,and the "C"was stamped at the dealers to mark as the last 2 years sold?
It looks as if the "C" is of slightly a different type face or size than the serial #,and could have been stamped at the dealers and factory.
These unsold motors in late 1949 at dealers and produced to clear out the production at the factory leave Evinrude in a situation of non sequential serial# all across the country when taking into account the dealers unsold stock in late1949.stock. That creates a real problem for Evinrude.
Maybe they contacted the dealers and asked for the remaining serial #’s in unsold stock, draw up a list of serial #’s out there ,so they could draw the line somewhere. They decided to lump all the remaining unsold motors with the "C"

I don’t think there is anyway to narrow down the exact year of production of a "C" motor due to the above circumstances.

Wouldn’t the car manufacturers like to have the capability of adding the "C" in their Vin #’s. Unfortunatly there is a windshield in the way. 🙂 Or they could just ship them to a 3rd world country to dispose of the leftovers, where they don’t have several gov’t agencies checking their every move. Garry posted "i could only guess"

We could discuss this at considerable length and really never know how/why/where the "C" came into use. OR could we? I am impressed what a capable bunch we are. 🙂

Jim PSB