I imagine most on here remember when Bell owned all the telephones. But I wonder how many recall "party lines."
We didn’t know anything else but party lines when I was a kid.
And yes, Ma Bell owned the phones and all of the equipment.
Seems so strange now.
I don’t remember party lines. I do remember when Bell owned all the phones; they were all manufactured at the massive Western Electric plant on Shadeland Avenue on the east side of Indianapolis. Those rotary phones were built like battleships. My parents’ house built in 1962 had three of them, and the one in the basement was still working when mom moved out in 2005. Next to the phone on the concrete block wall was all of my oldest brothers’ friends phone numbers from when he was in high school. They were still there for the new owner, but the numbers were probably not good.
Does anyone remember the “exchanges?” The exchnage had a name and the first two letters corresponded to the first two numbers. The northeast side of Indy was “CL” or “Clifford” exchange. The east side of Indy was “Melrose,” ME or 35. The phone number hand written on the tag in the center of the rotor in my parents house said “CL1-6334.”
My best friend in college lived on the east side; his number was 357-8887. Try dialing that on a rotary phone; it took a while.
RE: party lines... My best friend in college, early 1970s, brother lived in a rural area about 50 miles east of Kansas City and had a party line with about 6 house on the line. We will call my friends brother Bob.
So one day one of Bob’s friends calls up Bob to see if he wants to go out on the upcoming weekend. And Bob’s friend opens up when Bob picks up the phone with “Hey Bob what are you up to you know good rotten ****** ***** ******”
Bob said all he could hear was click, click, click, click, clock. He doubted any body on the line ever picked up his phone again :-)
Regards
alfa6 ;>}