Old Technology.....

[ultrarunner]

At my first job the office multiline phones had the buttons that would light up... Pac Bell

The "Stirrup" was removed that only allowed one line to be selected at a time... so you do your own conference call... they had 5 lines...

 

[Industrial Toys]

You can hit just the mic end of the handset or unscrew it, take it out and tap it on a hard table, which works best. We used to take those out of pay phones until they started gluing the caps on.

I had a 1A2 system at Dads and then an NEC Electra 16/48 with ET 16-1 stations. He was forever complaining about the carbon mics used in both and crackling handset cords on the NEC, but the Nortel system has been great. Sad, I threw so many systems in the recyling bin.

Yeah, years and years ago before you could get conferencing, I had my own 1A2 system with two lines. We used to call Pizza places and patch them together, on speaker phone, or chinese food places and even couples that had split up. We just howled! You called me, no you called me. There was of course, no caller ID.

 

[kcflhrc]

Hmm, interesting

 

[RobertN]

This last summer we were in Ocean City Md, and did a tour of the Seacrets Distillery. At the end, you go to a tasting room to try a few of their libations.

As part of the tour, one of the guests has to go into an antique phone booth, dial the "Speak-Easy" tasting room, and give them a code word before they open the doors.

The tour guide picked what appeared to be a mid 20's a guy. All he had to do is dial three digits. The rest of us were a mid-50's crowd; we all laughed when someone had to go help him

Seacrets Distilling Company Ocean City, MD | Spirits Spirits

 

[turnkey4099]

I have a rotary and touch tone answering machine on the same line...

People have commented how clear the sound is with the rotary... makes one wonder.

My oldest rotary is 1940's???

The home I recently bought was built/owned by a career Pacific Bell man... each room, including the bathrooms are wall phones... there phones at both ends of the garage and on the deck...

I guess it was opulent 25 years ago...

He had boxes of real antique phones... which the family kept... some were quite primitive... very crude wall phones...

I wonder how those kids would have made out with the old wall phone that used coded short and long rings by cranking. Ours was 2 loong, 4 short. To get to someone on another line you hjad to go through "central" (operator).

 

[oosik]

AH, HA - - now I don't feel so bad. Trying to figure how to dial a phone # with my new Smart Phone, the first time.

Turnkey - you ARE dating yourself. Our old Farmers Phone hung there on the wall. Our "ring" was - three short, two long.

I remember my dad had to replace the two big old dry cells in the phone.

Those were the days.

 

[Steppenwolfe]

That is a funny video. I am always calling one of my sons to help me on the computer or latest app for my smart phone. They act like I'm a moron for not knowing. We keep a land line in our house and cabin though we rarely use them.

 

[oosik]

Steppenwolfe - are you sure you're not talking to MY son??? He treats me like some sort of cave man. "Dad, how many times do I have to show you how to do this?"

Lordy, this new Smart Phone is a challenge for me. My "ham hands" don't go well with the new "light touch, swipe & stroke".

Typing on a keyboard the size of a playing card. He finally showed me - turn the thing horizontal and the keyboard is double in size.

AND - it's all the fault of the new technology on the Taco Wagon. That I MIGHT be getting, one of these days. My old Samsung flip phone just wasn't up to today's technology.

And the bottom line - when I FINALLY got voice activation set up and operating. Yelling & profanity don't seem to help one little bit.

Man, the good old days sure were good.

 

[Jstpssng]

Steppenwolfe - are you sure you're not talking to MY son??? He treats me like some sort of cave man. "Dad, how many times do I have to show you how to do this?"

Lordy, this new Smart Phone is a challenge for me. My "ham hands" don't go well with the new "light touch, swipe & stroke".

Typing on a keyboard the size of a playing card. He finally showed me - turn the thing horizontal and the keyboard is double in size.

AND - it's all the fault of the new technology on the Taco Wagon. That I MIGHT be getting, one of these days. My old Samsung flip phone just wasn't up to today's technology.

And the bottom line - when I FINALLY got voice activation set up and operating. Yelling & profanity don't seem to help one little bit.

Man, the good old days sure were good.

It doesn't work when trying to get past a "talking switchboard" which doesn't understand English either. Nor does it make the voicemail voice get to the message any faster when you don't really care who called, what time it was, duration of the voicemail... you will learn all of that if they would just give you the (bleeping) message.

 

[PILOON]

Old or not I have no choice.
Cell reception is spotty and internet is very slow.
A neighbor still uses his rotary as he is a real miser.

Just a few days ago I found a handful of phone line 'fuses' in my stock.
Being a local 'go to guy' folks always came to me with phone woes so I convinced the repairman to supply me with the diode types.

The maddening thing is we are but 1 hour north of a major metropolitan area (Montreal) but virtually ignored as to phone and internet services, not enough density. It is all about profits vs investment.

 

[flyerdan]

I have a Stromberg Carlson rotary dial phone with a 1973 date stamp on the bottom. I'd imagine that you could plug it in and it would work as good as when it was mothballed, which occurred after the second time a truck took out the low hanging line. Told the guy that fixed it the first time that it probably wasn't a good idea to have it at least two feet lower than the cable run that was right next to it, but he said it would be fine. He was wrong.
I'd recently gotten a cell phone because long distance was an additional $5 a month and a Tracfone was $60 for a year's service then, so that covered the ld plus mobility. I called the phone company and told them their wire was rolled up at the base of their pole, and to quit billing me, I'm done.

At least I trust noone here had to climb a pole to answer the phone because they ran out of wire to run it into the house like poor Oliver had to.

 

[MossRoad]

Here's the ads at the top of the page....

 

[MossRoad]

Oliver's speech....

 

[aczlan]

It doesn't work when trying to get past a "talking switchboard" which doesn't understand English either. Nor does it make the voicemail voice get to the message any faster when you don't really care who called, what time it was, duration of the voicemail... you will learn all of that if they would just give you the (bleeping) message.

Switch to Google Voice. Then you can get a text with a transcription of the voicemail, or listen to the message by dialing in, or from the app.

Aaron Z

 

[cqaigy2]

Was in a correctional facility that was getting ready to startup. These two young guys were setting up inmate phones. Push button on the wall, you pick up the receiver and press the buttons to make a call. They were checking the phones and they would pick the receiver up, cradle it between neck and shoulder and used both their thumbs to press the buttons on the phone. I have to admit, they were pretty fast at dialing that way. I was laughing and one of the older lieutenants on duty wandered over to see what i was laughing at, and i told him to watch and ask the telephone tech to dial again, that started him laughing too.

 

[turnkey4099]

AH, HA - - now I don't feel so bad. Trying to figure how to dial a phone # with my new Smart Phone, the first time.

Turnkey - you ARE dating yourself. Our old Farmers Phone hung there on the wall. Our "ring" was - three short, two long.

I remember my dad had to replace the two big old dry cells in the phone.

Those were the days.

Yep, have an emergency and you had to pick up the phone and ask everybody to get off the line so you could make a call. No privacy on such a line. Anyone could listen in to anyone on the same line.

 

[fried1765]

AH, HA - - now I don't feel so bad. Trying to figure how to dial a phone # with my new Smart Phone, the first time.

Turnkey - you ARE dating yourself. Our old Farmers Phone hung there on the wall. Our "ring" was - three short, two long.

I remember my dad had to replace the two big old dry cells in the phone.

Those were the days.

I still remember our old home phone number....386W3

It was an 8 party line, though usually did not have more than 6.

We could hear the rings on our side (the W side), but not the rings on the M side.
If you picked up the phone to make a call you needed to first listen, to hear if someone was already using the line.

We had a very nosy neighbor, (on the M side).
My dad would make a call, and she would often very sneakingly pick up (on her M side) and listen in.
My dad would say: Almena get off the phone! (it was ALWAYS Almena)

There were no wall phones, no rotary phones, no push button phones....only cradle type desk phones, and using a phone operator.

 

[2LaneCruzer]

Yep, have an emergency and you had to pick up the phone and ask everybody to get off the line so you could make a call. No privacy on such a line. Anyone could listen in to anyone on the same line.

Our wall phone was an old Kellogg phone, and I still remember our number too. It was 55F23...meaning two longs (55) on Farm Line 23. If you knew your neighbor's ring (eg. two longs and a short) and they were on your same line, just ring it yourself, no need to go through Central operator.