On Mon, 01 Jun 2015 02:36:30 -0500, wrote:

On Mon, 01 Jun 2015 02:59:06 -0400, micky
wrote:


I have to tell you about when my mother moved to western Pa. in 1945,
from Indianapolis. While NYC and probably some other places had dial
phones already, we didn't. So my mother would tell the operator,
OLiver 4-1383 please, or Oliver 4-3343 please,and after a couple days or
weeks, the operator told her, You don't have to say Oliver 4, Ma'am.
They're all Oliver 4.

I remember when I came home and they had installed dials. They changed
the phone in my parents' bedroom entirely, but the wall phone in the
idtchen they took the top off, connected a couple wires, and attached a
top with a dial.

One time I called my best friend and I heard click click, click click
click. I hung up and our phone rang. He had been calling me. The
phone didn't ring at his end when I called.

When I was REAL young, my parents phone was on a "party line". Sometimes
I'd pick up the phone, and the other party would be talking. I still
dont understand how that worked. I assume the other party had a
different phone number. My guess is that they ran two phone numbers thru
the same wires to save on wires. My parents were glad when they got rid
of the party line, but I think they had to pay a little more.

Lots of rural party lines had 6 or more customers on the same line -
they just had different "rings". When your phone rang there was 3
long and 2 short rings if you were ring 32, and 1 long and 5 short if
you were ring 15.

Your line number was the first part of your phone number - so you
could be 415R32 or 416R32 - with the line number assigned to your
local exchange. A local exhange in those days might have had 5 or 6
lines, with up to 20 or 30 or more customers on a single line. I think
the line was split into several subs, or party lines so not everyone
on a given exchange line was on the same party line. I remember my
grandfather's farm was on a party line with 7 or 8 other farms on the
concession - and was Ring32.