Hey Older DUers: What were the old telephone exchanges in your area?

[Floogeldy]

Remember when phone numbers started with letters, like ME-22987?

What were the exchanges in your home town?

The ones I remember from my town are:

Jackson
Melrose
Windsor
Skyline
Central
Garfield

Nostalgic!

B-)

[JimmyJazz]

1. I remember - Wyman-

I remember my parents saying that when giving out our telephone number.

[likesmountains 52]

2. Pyramid, Spring and Tuxedo...I miss those names.n/t

[Floogeldy]

17. I miss them too

They kind of had character and you had an idea what part of town things were in by knowing the number.

B-)

[last_texas_dem]

31. Tuxedo here

That's the only one I know of for my area. As long as I've been alive it's been all numbers, though...

[PittPoliSci]

3. i have no idea what that means.

could someone explain for me?

[Floogeldy]

4. Back in earlier decades . . .

. . . sections of towns had names given to them by the phone company. Your phone number would be something like "Melrose 98954," but everyone knew to dial ME-98954.

B-)

[PittPoliSci]

5. that's really cool.

I should ask people what my town's were.

thanks! :-)

[Radio_Lady]

52. Miami, Florida had some unique ones, very "chic" --

Especially my number, which was PL1-2460 (for PLAZA).

Then there was Coral Gables, Florida, about 15 ft. above sea level, which was HIghland! That used to get a big laugh.

[sparky_in_ma]

6. ALpine n/t

[MrSandman]

7. Viking....

Since every line had two to four houses on it, there was no need for another.

[Floogeldy]

12. Yes! I had forgotten about party lines.

We had a party line when I was very young.

B-)

[blue neen]

8. Grover

Ours was GR24783.

[RetroLounge]

9. Yorktown

RL

[senseandsensibility]

10. I don't consider myself young by any stretch

but I think I must have missed this by a few years. Are we talking fifties here? I do remember hearing these in old movies, and they sounded romantic. Also, I think I remember hearing my parents talking about them, saying that they were fazed out in the early sixties, maybe? They also talked about party lines. Anyone remember those?

[tyedyeto]

18. I was on a 4 party line in the late 70's...

very rural area in the mtns of CA. I still make sure I have a dial-tone when I pick up the phone to this day. Some habits are just hard to break. :dunce:

And for the 1st time ever, I used the dunce smiley....on myself even. LOL

[senseandsensibility]

27. Yes, I live in

CA too, but I know that party lines weren't just California, because I saw them in movies, like Pillow Talk, that took place in New York. I remember my parents saying that they shared a party line with the mayor of our town, and were kind of intimidated by it. It seems to have made an impression on them, condsidering they were practically teen-agers at the time, and sharing with this powerful man. ;-) How odd to think that you couldn't just use your own phone whenever you wanted.

[tyedyeto]

33. At that time, even in the late 70's...

people weren't conjoined to their phones. It was strange that you had to make sure the line was free of any other parties before using it.

On reflection, I believe my family had a party line phone in the 50's when I was a child, but at that time, children just didn't chat on the phone like they do today.

[MrSandman]

49. We had party lines in early 70's

[Floogeldy]

29. "Butterfield 8" is on TCM. That is what prompted me to start this thread.

B-)

[senseandsensibility]

37. Great movie!

I need to start checking out TCM! Now that I boycott all corporate news, I rarely watch TV, but I love old movies!

[brook]

59. BUtterfield 8-4000.

My # in 1963-64.The Croydon Hotel in Manhattan at 81st Street.

Others I've had: MOrsemere 6 - NJ; Crestview 5in LA.

I remember real live operators, too. Used to call London and Honolulu a lot and would startle the operator by giving the number I wanted along with the routing codes.

[candy]

11. Boston had-----

Hubbard,Hancock,Liberty,Commonwealth,Copley,Kenmore and a couple of others I can't remember.

There was Trowbridge in Cambridge.

[Floogeldy]

14. That's incredible

There must be a historical story or significance to each name. Weird.

B-)

[candy]

22. My city,Newton Mass had--

Bigelow,Lasell,Decatur,and Woodward.

Now that you've brought this up I may do some research to see where some of those names came from.

[lpbk2713]

36. Hingham had "Hingham"

Our home phone number was HI6-0641. I still remember it from 50 years ago.

[candy]

38. Well hello there,Hingham---beautiful town.

[lpbk2713]

50. Thanks

For a long time I thought all phone numbers started with the town's name.

[enigmatic]

13. Garfield 1-2323....

That number is imbedded in my brain from childhood thanks to Jimmy Dudley...

[tinfoilinfor2005]

15. Fireside

I was in the third grade and was taught to memorize, Fireside 32932. Not too much longer it was replaced by the code numbers 34. Maybe around 1955?

[Wapsie B]

16. The one I remember is Mercury.

That was the very last one we had.

[Sydnie]

19. Walnut

We were Walnut when I was a kid.

Where I live now, they only used 7 numbers when the people my age were kids here. They didn't even have to dial the first two at all.

Now, we are so populated in the state, we have three different area codes and must dial the area code along with even local numbers for the call to go through.

I never had a party line, but I had relatives that did. It was freaky to pick it up to discover it was for a neighbor and not for you. I also had relatives that had to have the operator dial the numbers for them. Maybe that was an extension of the party line, I'm not sure.

[Jackpine Radical]

20. We didn't even have exchanges where I grew up

in northern WI. Our number was 314-R & we shared the line with my uncle, who lived about a half mile away & had the number 314-W. You always knew that an R-number was 3 short rings, a W was 2 short, etc. You could listen in on other people's calls on your party line, which was one of the major vectors for gossip in rural America. If you wanted to call someone on your party line, you would just ring their code of short & long rings. To connect to a different party line, or to make a long-distance call, you had to call the operator, which you did by ringing one long ring. The operator (often called "Central" as in "Hellow, Central, give me 229-W) was a live person who rang the W code on line 229 &, when she got an answer, physically stuck a plug in a socket to connect you with the person you were calling.

The day operator was Mrs. Jensen, who naturally eavesdropped on all the interesting calls & knew everything about everyone in town.

[candy]

25. My aunts lived in a rural area as you described.

If you called central and asked her to ring a certain person she would say things like "She's not home,she's gone to the post office"

She knew EVERYTHING!

[Hell Hath No Fury]

21. JU...

for "Juniper" was ours when I was a very little girl. I am just old enough to remember that and also when we had a party line at my Grandma's house. I'm such a stinker -- I used to listen in on converstations. :)

[realFedUp]

23. Davenport

have no idea why.

[ChoralScholar]

24. Surely there is a repository on the Internet for these

somewhere....
--------
On Edit: Speak of the Devil and he shall appear

I found this on Google: (search was Telephone Exchange Names)

http://ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html

[ChoralScholar]

34. After searching

The exchange for Russellville, AR was

WOodlawn (96)

[tyedyeto]

35. I checked it out...

interesting in a historical sort of way.

[Floogeldy]

41. Who was the guy/gal that was assigned the task of creating the names?

Was that person local, regional, or national?

And why were they called "exchanges?" Was that an electronic term to describe how signals were routed?

B-)

[mcscajun]

51. Everything you ever wanted to know about Telephone Exchanges

...and more:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_switch

Lots of "named" exchange info here:
http://ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html

[Redstone]

26. M19. How's that for a phone number?

The town I grew up in didn't get dial phones until 1973.

Until then, it was pick up the phone and wait to hear "number, please?"

Redstone

[auntAgonist]

28. Sherwood

2, 3 or 4 then the last four digits.

so .. SH2-5555

[Lars39]

57. SH2-2188

I can't remember supper two days ago, but I remember this. :silly: :)

[auntAgonist]

62. did you live or do you live in that area?

[Lars39]

66. Did.

:)

[mopinko]

30. twinoaks

aurora, il. boy, hadn't thought of that in a long time.

[Lugnut]

32. Mercury

But I remember our phone number before that. My earliest memory is of 17M. The last number we had before rotary dialing was 1161. Yeah. I'm really old. :D

[mcscajun]

39. From the New York Historical Society...

When were New York City telephone exchanges switched from a combination of letters and numbers to all numbers?

The first all-number telephone exchange was assigned in 1960, to the offices of Western Electric, as part of the New York Telephone Company's long-range plan to avert an anticipated shortage of phone numbers.

And a long-range plan it was: not until 1978 were lettered exchanges eliminated from the white pages directory, followed by the switch to all-number exchanges in the yellow pages directory in February, 1979.

Still, many New Yorkers, for reasons of status, habit or sentiment, continued to state their numbers with the obsolete prefixes of PLaza 5, REgent-7 or TRafalgar-3 well into the 1980s.

http://www.nyhistory.org/library/nyhsqa.html

From my youth in The Bronx, I recall "FOrdham"-7, "CYpress", "TRemont", and "MElrose".

More info than you ever wanted here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_switch

Lots of "named" exchange info here:
http://ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html

[candy]

54. I was workiing for New England Telephone when they-----

started using all numbers instead of the old exchange words.

We all thought it was ridiculous because "Who will remember all of these numbers?"

Seems pretty funny now,doesn't it?

[mcscajun]

56. Yup. I had the same thoughts (of course I was much younger then.)

And the Named Exchanges were cooler, without doubt.

[Historic NY]

40. Jo1.......called John 1.........others followed 2, 4 & 5....

around my parts there were 2 different phone companies covering the town. Today we have so many different ones I can't keep track, usuaqlly someone will give me a number and I say cell phone and it turns out is their residence.

[demosincebirth]

42. TEmplebar,HIgate, OLympic,GLencourt, BEacon, OLiver,

TWinoaks, and many more that I can't think of. At least when someone gave you their phone #, you knew where they lived, now, I wouldn't know.

[Aristus]

43. If anyone remembers the ones from Puyallup, WA, let me know.

I'm betting something like Meeker, Canyon, Summit and Pioneer.

Anybody know?

[Beware the Beast Man]

44. Klondike.

[evlbstrd]

45. Westport.

Kinda cool.

[zann725]

46. Dupont, Belmont...

And I STILL remember my first home number when I was in grade school. (I was repeatedly warned that in case I got lost...which I did once...that number would get home.)

[thecai]

47. I Was Just Recently Telling A (Younger) Neighbor...

Fairfax
Madison
Riverside
Keystone
Temple
Hudson
Walnut

(that's all I recall, I was a child at that time)
Nostalgic, all right. :-)

[lumberingbear]

48. In SW Indiana

Crawford, Lincoln and Harrison.

[SoCalDem]

53. TAylor

55689:)

[tk2kewl]

55. only one i remember was Pioneer

[luvLLB]

58. woodlawn 2 and yukon 5

[proud2BlibKansan]

60. Endicott

Hedrick
Colfax
Finley
Westport
Emerson


Wow that is really a flash from the past.

[livetohike]

61. Fairview

Brandywine, Valley, and that's all I can remember :-).

[Momgonepostal]

63. Lambert

Before my time, but my mom's number used to start with LA.

[LoZoccolo]

64. The Telephone EXchange Name Project website is here.

http://ourwebhome.com/TENP/TENproject.html

[crispini]

65. That's kinda cool.

And to think that nowadays anytime I am in a town with seven digit dialing, i.e. 555-1234 I think it's sort of quaint, since my town went to ten-digit dialing four or five years ago.