Is there any scion available for these.
When I was a small child going to grade school (1930S) there was a red delicous tree on the way.the apples were small and very sweet. they had what I think was colled sugar core ( a transparent area surrounding the core) also I remember that the skin was more tender than todays
Jim asks, “Is there any scion available for these�
It’s pretty late in the season for stored scions … most having acquired them should have used (grafted) them by now.
The Red Delicious you describe reminds me of one my Great Uncle had on ‘the home place,’ where I now live. It’s quite red, but that may be from intense sun in a nice location; smaller than ‘store-boughten’ (likely due to poor soil in its sunny location), and does get “water-core,†that translucent sweet area you described (and I don’t know why?).
Commercial Red D’s have been bred for size, storage (with increasingly thick skin), and a pure red color (like the apples on the Wizard of Oz!). Nearly the same with Gravensteins; now larger, they’re a ‘different’ apple from the older varieties or original cultivars.
I have an older version of Gravenstein, on a 90 year old tree planted by my Great-grandfather (and orchardist). On a tour of this place HOS members verified this, as they enjoyed its more intense flavor, if in a slightly smaller package.
Your question is interesting; acquiring the ‘older wood’ you seek would be fairly difficult at our ‘Scion Exchange,’ as it’s all placed in the “Red Delicious†or “Gravenstein can†(as far as I know)… A year ago I specifically brought in Gravenstein wood collected from a very old Grav, marked and advertised it as such - and it disappeared! I now have a one year ‘shoot’ of that Grav attached to another apple tree, but hadn’t gone crazy propagating it for my own use as my old Grav seemed nearly identical in description.
I missed the Scion Exchange (Propagation Fair) this year due to a cold, and still have the pristine persimmon scions in my refrigerator I’d planned to take… But my apples are about to bloom, so no time for scions 
Think at least for the Red Delicious, you'd probably be looking for a "Hawkeye" apple; which is the original strain before it got overbred - there's an orchard near Sweet Home which has a tree; though it's probably too late to collect scionwood now! I had been hoping to try some apples from it, but missed them when they were ripe; and next time I was by there they'd been sold already - not that I'm a fan or Red Delicious apples (there are dozens if not hundreds that I like better!) but at least wanted to try the orginal one!
As for old Gravenstein, people in the HOS have some; but a bit late in the year to be looking for scionwood - if you don't find any this year; try next winter / early spring when trees are still dormant. I just cleaned out scionwood from my fridge last week, and it included some Gravenstein...but not a known old strain:)
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