# Do you remember how to use your new dial phone?



## Pappy (Oct 7, 2018)




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## Aunt Bea (Oct 7, 2018)

I remember!

When I started working some of the phones that were used for incoming calls only had these locks on the dial to prevent employees from calling family and friends.


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## hollydolly (Oct 7, 2018)

Oh yes indeed I remember well...I collect Vintage phones.. so I have plenty here to practice on if ever I was to forget..


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## RadishRose (Oct 7, 2018)

Oh sure I remember. That dial tone of hers was pretty abrasive, I think ours was smoother. I recall we had a 2-party line, but some people had up to 4! We didn't have it long.


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## jujube (Oct 7, 2018)

We had a four-party line for a while.  It wasn't too bad unless one of the "parties" liked to talk a lot and then you couldn't use your phone.  We had one old lady who liked to listen to everyone's conversations.  You could hear her breathing and my dad would say, "Mrs. _______, hang up!"  She'd always say, "I AM NOT LISTENING TO YOUR CALL!!!!"


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## RadishRose (Oct 7, 2018)

Remember Lily Tomlin as Ernestine the telephone operator? 
Do you remember Operators and Information?



"Is this the party to whom I am speaking?"


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## Buckeye (Oct 7, 2018)

I seem to remember a number we could call for "time and temperature"


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## jujube (Oct 7, 2018)

RadishRose said:


> Remember Lily Tomlin as Ernestine the telephone operator?
> Do you remember Operators and Information?
> 
> View attachment 57628
> ...




I worked on a old "cord board" like that (but larger) when I was 17.  I was the regular operator's lunchtime relief and I prayed and prayed hard that there wouldn't be many calls during that hour.   It was such a hassle to work one of those.


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## RadishRose (Oct 7, 2018)

Jujube, look how far we've come!


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## SeaBreeze (Oct 7, 2018)

Hoot N Annie said:


> I seen to remember a number we could call for "time and temperature"



Lol Hoot, I remember giving a boy in high school that number when he was hounding me for my telephone number.  My family didn't get a phone until I was in my teens, and I couldn't use it at first without my mother's permission.


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## Furryanimal (Oct 7, 2018)

That was the first type of phone we had when my parents decided we needed one.


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## Pappy (Oct 8, 2018)

My grandma had one of these back in the early 40s. The were several people on the same line. By the time you had a chance to make a call, someone else wanted to make a call too.


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## terry123 (Oct 8, 2018)

*party line*

We had a 4 party line  and we had that lady that listened to our calls too.


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## toffee (Oct 8, 2018)

locked phones remember them well when i was living in canada '' especially at my sis house with her daughters 'it was their punishment lol''happy days '''


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## Keesha (Oct 8, 2018)

Aunt Bea said:


> I remember!
> 
> When I started working some of the phones that were used for incoming calls only had these locks on the dial to prevent employees from calling family and friends.


Ive never seen these before. I suppose they needed some way of preventing employees from phone thief.



RadishRose said:


> Remember Lily Tomlin as Ernestine the telephone operator?
> Do you remember Operators and Information?
> 
> View attachment 57628
> ...


 She was hilarious.



SeaBreeze said:


> Lol Hoot, I remember giving a boy in high school that number when he was hounding me for my telephone number.  My family didn't get a phone until I was in my teens, and I couldn't use it at first without my mother's permission.


Hahaha Seabreeze. You sly one you. :laugh:



jujube said:


> We had a four-party line for a while.  It wasn't too bad unless one of the "parties" liked to talk a lot and then you couldn't use your phone.  We had one old lady who liked to listen to everyone's conversations.  You could hear her breathing and my dad would say, "Mrs. _______, hang up!"  She'd always say, "I AM NOT LISTENING TO YOUR CALL!!!!"



Haha JuJube! My best friend had one of those party lines and they had one of those lady’s also. She was nosey as ever. At times if someone was one the phone for hours you just couldn’t use it. My friend has 4 brothers and sisters and they’d just get on the phone and say Mrs. so & so , we need to use the phone now; could you get off. It used to crack me up all the time. :lofl:


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## Aunt Bea (Oct 8, 2018)

All of the oak wall phones were gone by the time I came along but a few of the folks that lived way out in the country still had these 1930ish rotary dial phones with an oak ringer box that was usually mounted in an out of the way location close to the telephone.


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## Ruth n Jersey (Oct 8, 2018)

I remember those phones. When I was a teen and got a new 45 record I would set up my little record player and play the song over the phone to my girlfriends. That worked well until the lady down the street who was on our party line complained to my Mother. That was the end of my disk jockey job.


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## gordoncarnegie47 (Oct 19, 2018)

Man alive this brings back some memories!


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## Beth Ward (Oct 27, 2018)

i was in heaven when my Father brought home a new dial phone and a TV.  I was in heaven.  Every Monday night at 8 pm, it
was “I Love Lucy” time.  I had a crush on Ricky Ricardo.


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## Sassycakes (Nov 10, 2018)

Beth Ward said:


> i was in heaven when my Father brought home a new dial phone and a TV.  I was in heaven.  Every Monday night at 8 pm, it
> was “I Love Lucy” time.  I had a crush on Ricky Ricardo.



Beth you just brought back a memory to me. I loved watching the I Love Lucy show. The only problem was that my bedtime was 8:15 pm. I would try to stall but my Mom was stern. I never got to watch the entire show. My Dad would try to help me ,but Mom always won that argument.


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## Getyoung (Nov 11, 2018)

When I grew up we had a rotary phone like everybody else, but I remember when the "push button" phones started showing up, man, was that high tech!! And then there were some where the numbers lit up, now that was cool!


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## Butterfly (Nov 12, 2018)

jujube said:


> I worked on a old "cord board" like that (but larger) when I was 17.  I was the regular operator's lunchtime relief and I prayed and prayed hard that there wouldn't be many calls during that hour.   It was such a hassle to work one of those.



I also worked one of those.  Mine was much larger, too.  I had little colored clothespins to mark which line was waiting for which extension.  It was indeed a hassle!  And you really had to pay attention to what you were doing.


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## Pappy (Nov 12, 2018)

I remember when we bought an extra long flexible cord that would go from one room to the next. The kids loved it because it would give them a little privacy. If I remember correctly, it would get all wound up after awhile.


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## Marie5656 (Dec 16, 2018)




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## Pappy (Dec 17, 2018)




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## Ken N Tx (Dec 17, 2018)




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## Ronni (Dec 17, 2018)

RadishRose said:


> Remember Lily Tomlin as Ernestine the telephone operator?
> Do you remember Operators and Information?
> 
> View attachment 57628



Yeah, in my late teens when I was in travel mode, I had a job for a while operating a switchboard.  "One moment please."  "Hold please"  "Connecting you now"  "Please go ahead"  Still remember the patter


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## MeAgain (Dec 17, 2018)

RadishRose said:


> Remember Lily Tomlin as Ernestine the telephone operator?
> Do you remember Operators and Information?
> 
> View attachment 57628
> ...



LOL, I had the 8 track of her with the exact image of what you put up,same dress and blouse.
 'One ringgy Dinggy .........." I'll unplug you a six pack at a time" .I think she was talking to Pepsi, not sure.


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## MeAgain (Dec 17, 2018)

I remember calling the time, in Atlanta it was Mareitta 5-8550 or aka 755-8550. I'm almost sure that was the number.

Also all the girls wanted a Princess Phone when they came out.


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## Marie5656 (Dec 17, 2018)

I can remember dial a prayer.  And paying for long distance calls.


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## Tommy (Dec 18, 2018)

Marie5656 said:


> And paying for long distance calls.


The "trick", upon arriving safely back at college, was to place a person-to-person call to our parents asking for a pre-arranged fictitious individual.  They would reply that the person wasn't there (so there was no charge) but they'd know that we'd arrived back safely.


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## Twilight (Mar 26, 2019)

I used to live in Las Vegas and we had one. I think it was 118.


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## fuzzybuddy (Mar 26, 2019)

I remember when dialing  local phones in my small home town, the numbers went from "7321" to "4-7321". People were all bent out of shape trying to remember all those 5 digits.The calls inside my town were non-toll calls. You could talk for as long as you wanted without a change in your bill. Making a toll call was a big deal. You kept looking at your watch so you wouldn't run up a huge bill.
Of course that was nothing compared when they came out with pastel colored phones. But you had to pay extra for them.


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## Buckeye (Mar 26, 2019)

Our first phone number was EMerson 7-7324.  This was about 1952 or so


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## gumbud (Mar 27, 2019)

Hong Kong was a great place all shops had black phones which were free for any customer to use at any time during opening hrs! - great social foresight?


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## Ken N Tx (Mar 27, 2019)

It's hard to find a public payphone no a days..


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## Pappy (Mar 27, 2019)

*There* are still 100,000 *pay phones* in America. In 1999, you could still plunk a coin into one at 2 million *phone* booths in the United States. Only 5% of those are *left* today. ... The demise of *pay phones* is an unsurprising result of cell *phones* in 95% of Americans' pocket, according to Pew Research.Mar 19, 2018.


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## Ken N Tx (Mar 27, 2019)




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## Sassycakes (Mar 27, 2019)

I remember out first phone number when I was a kid. It was *Fu*lton-9-7263.I remember when I had to give my number to my teacher and when I did I Told her she just had to dial the FU and then the numbers. I got really embarrassed when she laughed when I said FU. I also remember Party lines. When my brother was in the Army and living on Base me,my sister and my cousin Jimmy would go to the payphone. My cousin would ask the operator to call Circle 222 and another one,then we would hang up and run away laughing that we had pranked the operator.Oh they were the good OLD days.


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## Butterfly (Mar 27, 2019)

Tommy said:


> The "trick", upon arriving safely back at college, was to place a person-to-person call to our parents asking for a pre-arranged fictitious individual.  They would reply that the person wasn't there (so there was no charge) but they'd know that we'd arrived back safely.



Yup, I remember this.  It worked well.


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