Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!netsys!vector!telecom-gateway From: davef@brspyr1.brs.com (Dave Fiske) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: dialing with switchhook Message-ID: Date: 13 Apr 89 18:58:09 GMT Sender: news@vector.Dallas.TX.US Organization: BRS Info Technologies, Latham NY Lines: 27 Approved: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 135, message 5 of 7 In article , wrf@mab.ecse.rpi.edu (Wm Randolph Franklin) writes: > In the 60s pay phones were designed with mercury switches on the hook so > that if you tried to dial with the hook the splashing mercury would > defeat you. Otherwise you could make local calls for a nickel instead > of a dime, or some such thing. Here's a related anecdote. I saw an interview with Walter Cronkite once, where he spoke of his eary career as a newspaper reporter. One day the editor called him into his office, to ask about a reimbursement form Walter had put through for calls from pay phones. "What's this?" said the editor. "Well, I had to make some phone calls to the newspaper, and I want to be reimbursed." At this point the editor laughed and shouted out to another staff member "Hey, show this guy how to make a call from a pay phone," at which point the other person took two straight pins from the underside of his lapel, and stuck one into each of the wires leading to a pay phone in the hall. He then touched the wires together and the phone was powered up. Obviously, pay phones simply used a simple coin-activated switch to enable the connection in those days. -- "FLYING ELEPHANTS DROP COW Dave Fiske (davef@brspyr1.BRS.COM) PIES ON HORRIFIED CROWD!" Home: David_A_Fiske@cup.portal.com Headline from Weekly World News CIS: 75415,163 GEnie: davef