Old Telephone

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Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

Our fancy encrypted, spread spectrum, cordless wonder phone with integrated voice mail, call forwarding, caller ID and integrated Bluetooth technology recently died and it was my mission to find a replacement.

As I drove to the store this morning I noticed an estate sale and stopped by for a peek.

For $5 US I picked up this little gem, dated 1957. I cleaned it up, wired it with a new modular plug and stuck the connector into the wall. It works like a charm!

The thing that strikes me the most is the ringer. That glorious, analog, urgent ring! The wife bit off on it and it is now the default telephone in the house. (We giggle every time it rings, it brings us back to our youth) I had to hold a small training session with the kids to show them how to operate it.

The ironic part was when I called my mom to tell her about it. I called her on my cell phone, then used another cell phone, to call the old phone, so she could hear the "old school" ring over the cell phone I called her on. Confused

Posted: Sun Nov 04, 2007 11:26 pm

^^^^ How can you use it to place calls? It works on impulse, plug or no plug.

No?

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

Yes, it is analog. Qwest Communications, my telephone provider, apparently still supports it. I have made dozens of calls with it. It works great.

Edit: The old phone had "screw" type connectors. I cut those and soldered the red and green wire to the corresponding wires on a modern modular plug. Here it is with the DSL filter in line.

Click

It's ugly, but I was in a hurry. I will search for a more aesthetically pleasing solution soon.

Posted: Sun Nov 04, 2007 11:45 pm

kleindoofy wrote:

Wrap, crush, and tape

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

^^^Damn Right! Laughing

Baiting Guru Joined: 03 May 2007 Posts: 18313

My mom still has a wall "kitchen phone" with a rotary dial. (She also has newer cordless phones). When I'm there, I tend to go to that phone first, out of habit from that being our main phone when I lived at home so many years ago. It's no good for calling any place that gives you a computerized menu, and does seem to take quite a while to dial! Laughing

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 12:17 am

I, too, grew up with rotary phones, but hadn't seen one for years until we bought our last house a few years ago.

It has 3 (count them, three!) working rotary phones.

A friend who trades in antique phones and radios assured me that two of them are collectors items!

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 12:32 am

Nice to see another old phone in use. I've been a small-time collector of old phones for almost 30 years. I have many phones but most are too old to be put into working order. (Some are, but my 1930s to 1950s phones are currently in storage for lack of space.) However this 1920s payphone is wired up and does work great, though coins aren't needed. All I need is to have Humphrey Bogart pay a visit...

Payphones never had ringers originally. I shut off all the modern electronic chirpers (which I hate) and hooked up this late 1890s/early 1900s extension ringer box so we could enjoy the sound of real, honest-to-god bells when the phone rings:

The top of the dovetailed oak box is stamped "Property of New England Telephone & Telegraph Co."

Here's a favorite, definitely not in working order (made in 1905). The jars below the phone are batteries to power it. A bit bigger (and messier) than a cellphone battery:

And one more -- the first dial phone. It has 11 finger holes instead of 10, all on one side of the dial.

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

Juan Freizwidatt wrote:

However this 1920s payphone is wired up and does work great, though coins aren't needed. All I need is to have Humphrey Bogart pay a visit...

I love it. I am on the hunt for one as we speak! (Ebay is my friend)

The Eater never ceases to amaze me. One could be a collector of Aztec navel fuzz just to find another collector here, within minutes.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 12:58 am

Aztec navel fuzz! I have a massive collection! Check out the forum... Laughing

You'll find similar payphones on eBay but be aware that most are 80% reproduction parts. This really doesn't matter if you're using it for fun and not as a serious collectable, but don't pay top dollar.

You may just want to visit PHONECO first, since lots of eBay sellers get their inventory here. You may get a better price dealing direct.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 2:09 am

@Juan...your phones definately outdate mine!! Shocked

As a child, I can remember that it was just as easy to dial '0' for the operator, and ask for 'EXbrook9 - XXXX' or 'GRanite3 - XXXX', instead of dialing the number yourself. Wink

And if anyone can guess my age and location from that info, I'll buy you one year of premium membership!

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 2:23 am

crashhoot wrote:

... 'EXbrook9 - XXXX' ...

Or as Glenn Miller used to say: "Pennsylvania 6-5-000."

(Explain that one to your kids. Or to Radden Laughing

)

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 2:37 am

KD wrote:

Explain that one to your kids...

I'd just give them this link, or this one, and say "Knock yourself out!"

Rumor has it, that number is for the Pennsylvania Hotel, where Glenn Miller and his band used to play.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 3:26 am

Can you fix my heater? It died, and I've run all the checks on it I can. It's getting cold.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 3:40 am

JoeTam wrote:

It's getting cold.

Uhm, Joe, here is some advice...

1. Step back away from the refrigerator.
2. Close the refrigerator door. (Trust me, the light does go out.)
3. Don't you feel warmer now?
4. Put on an extra pair of pajamas, and go to bed.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 4:39 am

@Crashhoot
The area is Los Angeles, Granite 3 is West L.A. and Exbrook 9 is Santa Monica. At the risk of being banned I will defer in guessing your age.
although you are about my age I am guessing, maybe a few years older
And I remember being LE2-XXXX

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 5:53 am

kleindoofy wrote:

as Glenn Miller used to say: "Pennsylvania 6-5-000."

Back in the 80s I knew a guy (a few years older than me...) who had played trumpet in the Glenn Miller band. He was with the band during its heyday and is listed in all the discographies for the most famous recordings, including "Pennsylvania 6-5000." He had a trove of absolutely wonderful stories about his years in the band. He was the first to tell me the background on that song. As a big fan of big bands, I sure enjoyed those behind-the-scenes insights. I miss that guy.... Sad

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 5:59 am

Wow. I must be old. Granite was Beverly Hills back in the days of 213.

I still have one of those phones. You only had to wire up the tip and ring. It has an amazing carbon microphone that could pick up anything in the room because it does not have noise cancellation. Wiring too many in parallel would cause issues with ringer equivalents.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 6:46 am

Connie L. Gus wrote:

Wiring too many in parallel would cause issues with ringer equivalents.

Yeah, and then the phone company would come down on you for illegal extensions. Remember that? Every time you bought an answering machine you had to call the phone company to register it, and give the ringer equivalence or else they'd come after you. Shocked

Baiting Guru Joined: 04 Jan 2006 Posts: 3193

@Juan, you were lucky. Over in the UK the GPO had to come out and wire in anything. In fact they had to supply it and it remained their property. We still have a strange arrangement in the main connection box that means you can disconnect all the customer's wiring and equipment and leave a single plug direct to BT's equipment.

Pastor Frank wrote:

I had to hold a small training session with the kids to show them how to operate it.

I had to do that for some youths a few months ago in a Frankfurt Museum. They were making the same mistake that my uncle describes making the first time he came across a dial phone - when they were new.

Somewhere on the net is an article about converting one of those phones to a cell-phone.

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 11:09 am

I remember those rotary phones. Took forever to dial! Confused

I also remember having one on the wall in the kitchen growing up. Only difference is that my father built a box w/ door around it, to use it, open it up. It looked a lot like this:

It was pretty funny watching so many people try to use the fake phone on the outside before telling them to open it up. Very Happy

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Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 3:52 pm

thud419 wrote:

Over in the UK the GPO had to come out and wire in anything. In fact they had to supply it and it remained their property.

That was true in the US as well when I was growing up. The change was gradual. It slowly became legal to buy a phone or answering machine, and by then plugs (not yet modular) replaced hard-wired phone lines. But each time you bought a new piece of equipment you were obliged to report it before connecting it to the line. When the phone company was de-regulated they offered to sell you the previously leased phone(s) in your house or business, or they would remove them. I paid them for mine and got a little sticker to put on the bottom to indicate I was now the legal owner.

And speaking of cell phones, here's a prediction from a magazine in February 1908:

Another magazine in 1908 said "When the expectations of wireless experts are realized everyone will have his own pocket telephone and may be called wherever he happens to be. The citizen of the wireless age will walk arouind with a receiving apparatus compactly arranged in his hat and tuned to that one of myriad vibrations by which he has chosen to be called." Very Happy

Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 3:57 pm

At one time in the States, if you had a lightbulb that burned out you could take it to the local power company and turn it in and they would replace it for you. They would also fix your broken appliances.

Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 12:43 am

Back on topic, at remote trailheads in Sequoia National Park, the had phones you would crank to connect to an operator. Then they would dial your number for you. I believe it was a dynamo type of signaling device.