Telephones... then and now

[hawkeye08]

Except bottled water is sealed, so it is obvious when you open the bottle..

Not when you open it as you hand it them

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Lol, reminds me of caddy shack, and the beer bottle that he puts a cap back on.

 

[ultrarunner]

Seems to be today's business model. No one looks past the end of their nose. My last company was same way, brought in younger guys to run things that didn't have a clue.

It really makes me appreciate the early days I worked at a Union Tool and Machine company... lots of extraordinary talent based on shop floor experience.

We had one old German guy that learned his trade in Germany starting at age 14... his family had to pay to get him into the apprenticeship program and he paid his father back every Pfennig...

Anyway... when he retired the same job he had done for years could no longer be done... he knew just how to manipulate the mill to get precision tolerances that no one was able to duplicate...

One of my friends is 74 and Utility Company Lineman.... with military credit he has over 50 years on the job... he is the go to guy in the region for many things because he was there when it all went in and has the answers...

He loves his job but said the day he doesn't he is out and let management know he was serious... plus with his seniority he can pretty much pick an choose...

His wife stopped asking when he might retire... because the answer is always the same... when I feel like it... they do take some really nice vacations and he dotes on his grandkids that all live nearby...

It's often the same story that it takes several to fill the shoes when they are gone.

I got a recorded message from ATT that they will be sending someone out... no idea when?

Now ATT fiber is out all the time but they don't know anything about copper.

 

[Industrial Toys]

I have a young VERY talented friend with limited education and no experience. He never ceases to amaze me, and I have to wonder if he is the reincarnation of some passed on by-gone era machinest. I wouldn't know how else to explain it.

 

[TomSeller]

wonder if Sears still supports my phone.

The switchboard lady died of boredom, so there is no way to call and find out. So you'll have to take it in.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

It was my grandfather's phone, to call down the hill to his dad's place. Was direct wired. My grandparents never had a regular phone to call anyone.

 

[k0ua]

It was my grandfather's phone, to call down the hill to his dad's place. Was direct wired. My grandparents never had a regular phone to call anyone.

I kinda wondered what that was, because it wasn't until the Carterphone decision of 1968 that paved the way for people to own phones. It wasn't common until really the 70s or 80's for individual to really own them depending on where you lived. I had some in the late 60's as a kid and hooked them up, but the phone company did not know about them and would have thrown a fit if they found them. We just didn't hook up the ringers, so when they were on hook, they couldn't be detected.

 

[ultrarunner]

I remember when you bought a phone and needed to provide the ringer equivalent to the Telco...

The last time I did that no one knew what I was talking about...

We bought the phones we had in the house when they were offered... Grandma kept paying for hers... when she passed the phone company did not want it back...

Mom's phones still have the sticker on the bottom as proof they were purchased.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

I think before ma bell, before dial tone, it was local crank phones and local switchboard and people owned them. Bell brought the regulations.

 

[ultrarunner]

I think the last switchboard operator, at least in the West, was the operator on Catalina Island off the Southern CA coast.